Toxic Telepathy
by LeahSkywanker
Summary: Cobra has to make a decision, join a legal guild chosen by the council or go back to prison, easy choice right? Well Fairy Tail is the only one willing to help him rehabilitate. Maybe being well behaved isn't as bad as he once thought and just maybe one day he could go back to being Erik. CoLu story.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N Cobra and Lucy have always been an interesting one for me, couldn't resist.**

Chuckling darkly, Lucy stalked across the pitch black gym at the guild, nobody would be here yet, except for him. Being careful to be as quiet as possible, she tried to avoid all of the discarded equipment that her idiot guild mates always 'forgot' to put back.

She glanced down in disdain at the dumbbells that were just strewn across the floor _._

' _This is going to cause an awful accident one day and I'll probably laugh when it does.'_

Following close behind her was Loke, like a loyal lion obeying his master, who was mumbling his discomfort at doing this at such an ungodly hour, or just for doing it at all.

"I'm all for doing this to lovely ladies." he announced, his eyes twinkling "But I can't help but wonder why we're doing this to _him._ " Spitting out the word him as if it was foul tasting on his tongue.

Lucy rolled her eyes and let out an exasperated sigh, why did she bring him again?

"Loke, will you just shut up? He'll hear us, we've been planning this for weeks, don't ruin it."

Getting closer to the sound of the shower running caused her to pause and slide along the wall, looking at the side of the room where the trickling water was coming from, she located her prey.

Slipping past the entrance to the shower cubicle she heard a man singing "Shubiduba." in a gravelly voice.

 _'Yep, Karma's definitely going to be a bitch Black Steel.'_

Still in the dark, Lucy's hand grasped the moist shower curtain and yanked it off the railing, exposing the man behind it.

"Use regulus now Loke, light this motherfucker up!"

Nodding with his eyes firmly closed to make sure he didn't see the naked dragon slayer in front of him, Loke cast a bright beam of light, illuminating Gajeel's nude form and shocked face, which was the perfect opportunity for Lucy to snap a picture.

Her eyes briefly meet his wide crimson ones. Lucy raised one of her eyebrows and blew him a kiss, then ran away, laughing like a maniac.

"That'll teach you for peeking on me in the shower you big metal perv, see you in the training room." Her voice floated down to his ears as he scrambled to grab his towel and run after the troublesome blonde. ' _I_ _wasn't peeking.'_ He thought sourly as he trudged after her.

* * *

"Laxus you should've seen his face." Lucy spat out between laughs "He has this whole deer in the headlights look going on, super attractive Gaj." She winked at him causing a slight growl to leave his lips, making her laugh even harder.

They were doing their daily work out session in Fairy Tail's newly renovated gym. It didn't take long for her, Gajeel and Laxus to convince gramps that having a gym installed into one of the lower levels of the guild would be a great investment. Gramps would do anything to please his kids.

Plus once Lucy said that they would front all of the Jewel needed to buy the equipment, he had no reason to say no. Lucy was the person with

She loved the freedom of their morning gym sessions, they had started about 6 months ago when they all used to use it but in hour slots separately. Lucy needed the motivation to actually do something and both Gajeel and Laxus had offered, then realized they had both offered and argued as to who was going to do it.

"This gym isn't big enough for two dragons sparky."

Laxus wasn't amused by this, as the future guild master, he had to swallow his explosive temper, before he could be the responsible one and say he could train blondie she blurted out "You can both help me, I have zero motivation so I may need two dragons to help me, you up to the job boys?"

They both looked at the celestial mage, she had her hands on her hips with an adorable pout on her face, then at each other and begrudgingly agreed.

They found after the first couple of weeks that they all actually got on really well and chose each others company more often than not over their normal friendship circles.

Laxus's laugh bellowed across the empty gym. "Gajeel that's super lame man, thought us dragon slayers were supposed to have super hearing? How did she manage to sneak up on you."

"Bitch has super ninja skills, be careful Laxus you could be next. Nobody is safe." Gajeel mumbled as he placed his weights back on the bar and walked over to his bag to pull out an iron bar and a water bottle.

Pulling off his head band, Gajeel nosily munched on his metal and watched Lucy as she walked over to the dumb bells. She was slowly lifting more and more weight, slow and steady, just like Laxus had advised her.

She had visible muscle now on her arms and stomach, where it was soft before it was now toned and tight. The stronger her body was the stronger her magic became, no more feeling weak.

She had had enough and was glad she was making a change for the better. Laxus counted how many curls she had to do before she could call it quits and go to the guild hall for her celebratory strawberry milk shake.

"Nice work today blondie, look at your little guns." The lightning mage said squeezing her small biceps which caused her to giggle. Shoving him away, she gestured towards his huge body.

"Shut up, it's not my fault you have an insane amount of muscle mass. Nobody could ever match up to you."

Gajeel had met Levy at the gym doors, not wanting to interrupt their 'a bit too steamy for public' kiss, Laxus picked Lucy up, slid past them and gave her a piggy back ride to the bar.

"Onward Blondie, to the bar." Lucy declared pointing in front of them, they both called each other blondie since Laxus gave her the nickname and she always said he was blonde also so they shared the pet name.

They were more like siblings then anything else, they were both only childs and had always wanted a brother/sister.

He picked up speed, causing her to jiggle from side to side from the galloping he did. Laughing, she was jolted forward and nearly fell over his shoulders, she slapped his head playfully, digging her ankles into his sides like you would with a horse to spur them on.

"Hey horsey why did you stop? Did I get a bit-" ' _heavy'_ she finished in her head.

 _'What is he doing here?'_

* * *

 _'This was such a stupid idea.'_

Cobra was seriously regretting his decision but what other choice did he have? Rot in jail or join a legal guild for observation, to see if he had reformed enough to join regular society. Tough choice, right?

He hadn't reformed, he still thought about killing and dismembering people, but it didn't matter as he was the one who could read minds not the people who would be observing him.

Willing his brain to stop overthinking something for once in his damn life, he realized that the carriage had stopped, maybe his stomach might settle a bit now.

"Time to go reptile." The guard escorting him spat out as he yanked him out through the open carriage door, causing Cobra to face plant the floor. Groaning in pain, he could taste dirt in his mouth.

 _'So disgusting.'_

"Did you forget you handcuffed me shit head?" The poison slayer shouted as he was pulled up by his deep maroon hair.

The guard just smirked. Cobra could his thoughts as clearly as he could smell the alcohol that was lingering on his breath from the previous night. 'O _f course I didn't.'_

The guard's soul started talking to Cobra, telling him all his darkest secrets. So this one liked to dress up in his wife's clothes and have his male bed companions tell him how pretty he was.

Cobra was escorted up to the guild doors and uncuffed by the secret cross dresser. Cobra gently rubbed his freed wrists, phantom pain was still there from when he had been constantly cuffed in the tower of heaven, the wounds had long since healed but the scars remained. They would always hold the pain that he had suffered from his time at that shit stain on earth.

Turning to look at the guard with his good eye, he smirked as he blew out a small amount of poison, causing the man to start choking, his eyes were streaming from the toxic air that was now surrounding him.

"See you around pretty girl."

The guard's face paled even more at Cobra's choice of words.

 _'how did he know- goddammit he can actually read people' minds? I thought that was just a myth, fucking freak-'_

He left the guard sputtering to himself as he entered the guild.

 _'Not many people here_ he thought.'

Good, he could actually think in peace, sometimes when he was in a too crowded area, all the souls overwhelmed him. His anxiety wasn't anywhere near as bad as it used to be, but sometimes it caused his chest to get that bit too tight and he couldn't fill his lungs with enough oxygen.

He didn't need that shit. He didn't miss being in the Oracion Seis but he missed what being in a renowned dark guild did for his confidence. Now he was just a criminal.

Walking over to the bar the first thing he saw was a giant of a man, carrying a giggling blonde, her soul sung for him, like a beautiful symphony, he closed his eye to focus on it.

Why did it seem so familiar. It was so soothing, it had instantly calmed him down.

Hearing a low growl, Cobra reluctantly opened his eye.

Someone's soul wasn't happy to see him. Actually, a lot of souls weren't happy to see him. Weren't they expecting him? Was this all some big joke to get his ass kicked? Maybe they'd let Fairy Tail beat him up and then haul him back to prison.

Looking at the cause of the noise he paled, not from the muscle head looming over him but from the girl he was holding whose soul was so very beautiful. It was speaking to Cobra.

 _'What is he doing here?'_


	2. Chapter 2

Being slapped definitely hurt a lot more than being punched, Cobra decided as he rubbed his sore cheek that was caused by the petite hand of Lucy Heartfilia.

 _'I definitely deserved that.'_

After realizing just who she was he was kind of happy that she had hit him, he could clearly see the anguish shining in her watery brown eyes as she stood in front of him in her scanty gym attire.

His quick glance down at her bronze toned legs didn't go amiss as he heard her soul practically screaming at him.

 _'Is he actually checking me out after everything that's gone down between us? I'm going to cut up his good eye but show him that picture of Gajeel first so that last thing he will ever see is a big floppy dick.'_

Lucy took a step forward, smirking as she reached for her pocket.

His eye widened as he realized she was actually going to act on her thoughts, jumping back a step, he wasn't used to people actually acting on their thoughts.

"Look princess I'm not here to cause trouble, no need for eye gouging and shoving people's flaccid dicks in my face. Unless you want to fight, I'm always up for wrestling with pretty girls." He waggled his eyebrows at her causing a growl to leave her plump lips. Would biting them make her shut up? He would like to try.

Lucy pounced onto Cobra like a lion latching onto it's prey, Loke would have been proud.

Straddling the poison dragon slayer's chest, Lucy fully intended on causing a few more scars on his stupidly handsome face. A hearty laugh erupted from Cobra which made her to pause in her violent advances.

 _'A man so evil shouldn't have such a jovial laugh, what the hell.'_

"Look I can't help that I'm blessed with such a handsome face, don't blame yourself for liking it so much, you are a woman after all."

Another growl left her lips as she gripped his shirt in her hands but he continued to talk.

"If you wanted to have sex with me we could just go somewhere private instead of in the middle of your guild sweetheart."

 _'What an earth caused him to say such a thing?'_

Then it dawned on her. She squeaked in shock and was pulled off his body by a pair of strong arms.

"Don't read my mind you dick bag." Lucy lunged for Cobra again but was unable to move an inch. Groaning at being restricted, she looked back at the man holding her with a 'are you kidding me.' face.

"Gaj let me go, you know what this guy has done to me, to us all!" He looked down at her and slowly shook his head.

"Sorry about this Luce." And then he chucked her over his shoulder and turned to walk out of the guild. She started hammering his face with punches which in turn caused him to turn his skin into his iron dragon scales. She huffed in defeat.

* * *

As he watched the feisty blonde get carried away by a man covered in piercings, he took the time to appreciate how perfect her ass looked in those tight little shorts. So round and-

 _'Don't look at my ass shithead, I know you can hear me, this isn't over, you owe me fight. I'll see you later, count on it.'_

It was kind of cute how she tried so hard to be intimidating. If she wanted a fight she would get one. In his own twisted way he thought that letting her beat him up might help her heal from all the bad stuff he had done to her.

He would find and follow her tantalizing scent after he had seen this Master Makarov and get all checked in so the council would officially sign him over to Fairy Tail. Cobra sauntered over to the bar where a woman with white hair and a pretty smile was stood, seemingly waiting for him.

"Hello Cobra, my name is Mira, we've been expecting your arrival. Well I have, we didn't expect anyone to be here so early so Lucy showing up was very unfortunate. We were hoping to get you both to meet in a controlled environment, safer that way but oh well, she's already struck it seems."

Mira giggled as she pointed to his still red hot cheek that the feisty blonde had slapped. He was sure that there must be a exact replica of her hand on his skin, she had struck him that hard.

"Master is just upstairs waiting for you, try not to get into anymore trouble on the way up there."

Walking away from the still giggling woman, he shook his head, as if trying to shake away the crazy that just seemed to seep out of the walls of this place.

The blonde muscle head that had been carrying Lucy when he arrived had now disappeared, Cobra noted, as he climbed up the stairs. Just as he was about to enter the room Mira had said their guild master was in he heard the woman's soul say something that made him get a single fluttering butterfly in his stomach.

 _'He's going to fit in here just fine.'_

* * *

"Lucy when are you going to stop putting yourself into harm's way? Nobody wants to lose you, Me and Laxus especially but attacking an ex member of a dark guild is not a way to keep your promise to us!" Gajeel roared at the blonde mage as she was sat on her bed, watching her friend pace the length of her room.

"Did you just expect me to stand there? His smug face was practically begging me to slap it, it's not my fault." She replied shrugging her shoulders. "And I have kept my promise, no more reckless solo missions, I'm not afraid to ask for help anymore, I'd never put either of you through that ever again." She thought back to the time he was referring to. It was after Team Natsu had been split up by Gramps order as they were simply too destructive.

They had all gone their separate ways, Erza had been spending an awful lot of time going around secretly with Jellal and Meredy, Gray had been taking missions frequently with Juvia, each time they returned they were closer and more intimate with each other. Then there was Natsu.

He went on long missions to help improve his strength and usually took Wendy along with him to help train her into becoming a fully fledged dragon slayer, he had really taken her under his wing.

Lucy was kind of just left behind, it was nobody's fault, she just didn't fit into anybody's plans. So she just stuck with doing any interesting solo missions that popped up on the request board.

She chose a mission one day that was a little too above her skill level but the pay was too good to turn down. If Master hadn't forced Gajeel and Laxus go on a mission together they wouldn't have been passing by and they wouldn't of heard her screams.

Lucy really did owe them her life and so they made her swear to be more careful with it and cherish it, which she did, thanks to them.

Laxus stormed through her front door and hugged Lucy, murmuring into her hair.

"You're an idiot blondie but you've got some big balls, taking on a dragon slayer after a leg day at the gym, we've trained you well."

"You're the idiot, idiot. Don't encourage her, he could've really hurt her." Gajeel grumbled, pushing Laxus's shoulder jokingly.

He scoffed "Yeah and we would've taken him out easy, she deserved at least to get a hit in, which by the way was executed perfectly, well done sis."

Lucy grinned like the Cheshire cat and stuck her tongue out at Gajeel, at least one of her adoptive brothers supported her.

* * *

After having a rather long winded talk about family and respect for each other the tiny guild master took out the Fairy Tail guild stamp "Where do you want it my boy?" Makarov said waving the stamp around menacingly. Cobra eyed the object warily, this was it, game on.

"Once you have this mark on your body Cobra you will be part of our family, please respect that and treat everyone accordingly. We're giving you a second chance at life, don't throw it away over what happened in the past."

Nodding his head, Cobra motioned to the back of his right hand "Here, in purple."

 _'This'll piss off that blonde princess.'_ He thought, remembering that she had her guild mark on the back of her hand, at least they had something in common now.

* * *

Managing to finally get rid of Laxus and Gajeel, Lucy slipped into the bath she had just made, letting out a quiet moan of relief, just the thing she needed to help her unwind and sooth her aching muscles.

She must have dozed off because before she knew it she was dreaming about that sexy moronic poison dragon slayer asking her if she wanted to fight now, frowning, she thought ' _of course I do.'_

Cobra sniffed his way to Lucy's house, a strong vanilla trail coupled with the smell of sulfur from the lightning slayer and a metallic twang from the iron slayer, they obviously spent a good amount of time together for their smells to be so integrated with each others.

Those two particular smells were fresh on this trail, just going in an opposite direction now, they must have left her house recently.

 _'That's useful then.'_

He didn't want to fight with anyone but her right now. Everyone else could get in line.

 _'Not that it's going to be much of a fight.'_

Walking up to door that her scent lead to, he tried to open it but it was locked. Looking around for another entrance, his eyes locked onto her slightly ajar window on the top floor. Bingo.

Climbing up and jumping through the window was the easy part but facing her was proving to be much harder. His nerves were getting the better of him. He was standing outside the room she was in, working up the courage to turn the handle. Doing an internal war cry he pushed through the door "Did you want to fight now or-"

 _'This is her bathroom.'_

Completely dumbstruck, he stared at the naked blonde below him, asleep but slowly waking up.

" **Shit** " He whispered.


	3. Chapter 3

_'What the hell do I do now.'_ Cobra panicky thought. He had spent a little bit too much time gazing at the sleeping blonde, her being completely naked was really quite distracting.

Sure the bubbles that were in her bath were sadly covering the most important parts but if he looked really hard he could almost see her-

"Laxus go away, I don't want to train today." Lucy mumbled, causing Cobra a near heart attack, she rolled onto her side in the bath causing one of her large breasts to become uncovered. As the cool air touched her nipple, it soon hardened into a stiff peak.

Unconsciously leaning forward, Cobra parted his lips and was centimeters from making contact with her pebbled flesh, but was struck across the face with a wet limb, causing him to, for the second time in one day, face plant the floor.

His nose struck the tiles and crunched. ' _Oh fuck it's broken.'_ Cobra tried to hold the blood in his hands, she'd caught him, now to let her beat him around a bit.

"Naked wrestling is even better than regular wrestling, let's do this." He croaked out, when she didn't respond he glanced up at her and was floored, she was still asleep, after all that.

 _'This chick obviously loves to sleep.'_

Being a coward was what he was all about right now, as much as he teased her, he didn't want to fight her while she was naked . It probably wouldn't bother her considering how little clothing she wore anyway. She much be fairly comfortable with her body, he didn't want to accidentally do something he'd regret, like cop a feel of those magnificent breasts she was unknowingly teasing him with.

Making sure that her head was safely above the water level, he gently turned her head to face him and studied her slack face, yeah she sure had the looks of angel, but the tongue of Satan. A deadly combination.

All that was on his mind when he was told to capture her by Midnight was who and when, never why. Feeling a pang of guilt wash over him, he quickly rearranged himself in his trousers and made his first good decision of the day and high tailed it out of her apartment, not realizing the blood droplets he had left on her floor.

* * *

Lucy woke with a start, the bubbles in her bath were just starting to go up her nose, causing a gentle sneeze to wrack her tired body. _'How long did I sleep for.' S_ he thought as she stood up, feeling like a ten ton whale after being in the bath for so long, her naked body cried at the cold breeze blowing into the room.

 _'Could've sworn I closed the bathroom door when I came in.'_

Stepping onto her tiled floor she winced at the cool surface, glancing down at the offending floor she squeaked.

"Oh my god am I bleeding? I'm not due for another week, I swear if Laxus worked me so had I started early again I will scream."

She checked between her legs but there was nothing. She was clean. Now extremely confused, she pegged it down to a previous injury of hers or Gajeel and Laxus, they were here enough and because of how busy she had been recently she hadn't cleaned as much as she probably should have. Quickly wiping the dried blood off the floor, she chucked away the evidence and thought nothing more of it.

Taking a slow stroll to the guild she summoned Plue for company, he popped out of his gate, landed on the floor and gazed up at his master expectantly. She sighed, smiling at her adorable spirit. "Plue, coming from the celestial world isn't a trick, you can't expect to get a lolly each time you're summoned."

This caused a large pout to form on the the little dog's face "Pun punnn." he said sadly, holding out his arms.

Giving in to his cuteness, she pulled a big red lollipop from behind her back, which caused Plue to squeal in delight and clap his hands together, once the sweet was popped into his mouth he started to dance his way to the guild, Lucy following closely behind him, shaking her head.

She gazed up at the night sky and tried to convince herself that tonight was going to be fun, it was Cana's birthday party, she probably has at least two a month but still.

That girl will use any excuse to drink and get all of us to tag along too. The celestial mage could probably use a stiff drink or two after seeing Cobra today.

 _'Oh Mavis, I really hope he won't be there. Nobody would have invited him would they? They hate him as much as I do.'_

Knowing her luck of course he would be there.

Pushing the guild doors open she was tackled by a heavily armored body, causing her to knock into Plue who disappeared, leaving behind a poof of smoke and a half eaten lolly he would probably still ask for later.

"Lucy I have missed you dearly, come have a drink with me, let us discuss when you will be coming on a mission with me and Jellal."

Looking for anybody to help her, she only managed to catch the eye of a very smug looking amethyst one. She scowled at Cobra as she was dragged across the floor by her friend.

Erza saw Lucy glaring at Cobra and sighed.

"Lucy listen, I'm going to give you a bit of advice, from what I have heard, Cobra has come a very long way from where he once was. Why don't you give him a chance? I mean look at you and Gajeel, he did no worse to you than Cobra did and you guys are best friends now."

Lucy hated how right Erza's words were.

"People deserve second chances. Think about it, you might have more in common then you think."

* * *

Later on in the night Lucy had somehow ended up in the middle of a game of never have I ever with some people, including Cobra.

Everyone was laughing and joking with him, after having drunk a fair few of Mira's special blends, she had enough liquid courage going through her system to give her the balls to speak up.

"I've got one guys" She said, aiming her stare at the poison slayer "Never have I ever attempted to kill someone in cold blood."

Maintaining eye contact with her, he took a shot of gin. Then stood up and walked outside.

Lucy felt a sharp flare of shame for stooping so low as to embarrass him in front of her guild, thinking back to what Erza had said earlier on she rushed out after him.

Laxus kept his eye on his adoptive sister and followed her to the doors to keep his ear out for any disturbance.

' _Those two need to sort this out.'_ he thought, watching her retreating form. 'O _therwise she'll never fully heal from what happened to her.'_

Cobra hadn't felt so embarrassed in a very long time but when that blonde bitch said what she did in front of everyone he almost lost his very short temper. Being the bigger man and walking away was the only option. He didn't want to ruin his one chance of getting out of prison.

Running his hand through his hair he felt someone touch his back, spinning around he flipped them onto their back and held his now clawed hand around their throat, gripping tight.

Wide, hazy brown eyes stared back at him, not scared in the slightest but merely shocked.

"No man has ever had me on my back, it's a nice change of pace."

' _Was she implying she was a virgin?'_ He questioned in his head. ' _No way in hell could she be that perfect.'_

She giggled nervously "You can let go of my neck anytime now, i'm into rough play but you're taking the piss, I can feel the poison rippling off you."

Releasing his bruising grip on her, he relaxed his fingers and cringed at the light purple tinge he had left on her graceful neck.

Rubbing the back of his neck anxiously, he decided to play the aggressive card, it was hard to know how to act around her, he rarely heard her thoughts but when he did they were only aimed at him. It was like she could shield herself from his magic except when she was thinking about him.

"Don't you know better then to sneak up on a mage? I could've seriously hurt you." He snarled at the blonde causing her to burst out laughing.

"You've already attempted to kill me before, a bruised neck is the least of my worries. I thought you were a dangerous dragon slayer with a magic for reading minds? Couldn't you hear my thoughts when I was walking behind you? Pretty rubbish if you ask me, I was practically stomping to you, you'd be an awful guard." She raised her eyebrows at him, practically begging for him to argue with her.

Cobra scoffed "I was thinking, I don't have to be a dragon slayer all the time, I can just be me. And I don't read minds, souls talk to me."

 _'Maybe he has changed,_ _maybe he should be given a second chance, he could have a third too for his visually pleasing facial structure. Do you think he'd mind if I licked his cheek bone?'_

This peaked Cobras attention, he could hear her soul now. And boy was it singing a sweet song for him.

"How much have you drunk princess? Do you need help getting home?" Cobra said, trying to sound as not creepy as possible, the last thing he wanted was her thinking he was going to try have his way with her. Yes his member was standing to attention from her dirty thoughts but that wasn't his fault, she shouldn't be thinking like that around him, it was dangerous.

"I don't live far from here, you could walk me home and we can talk. I'd like to talk to you cob- oh Mavis on a cracker I cannot call you that ridiculous name, what is your real one?" He was obsessing over how cute she was as she was huffing to catch her breath after talking so quickly that he didn't even think about what he said next.

"It's Erik sweetheart."

For the first time in his life, he wasn't scared, he didn't feel the need to hide behind Cobra and he felt like he could just be Erik, even for just a second, it was nice.

The pair walked to her house in a comfortable silence, he let her lead the way as he couldn't let on that he actually knew where she lived, that wouldn't go down well.

She pointed to her front door "Well this is me, thank you for walking me home, I appreciate it. I'm sorry for being a dick muffin at the guild, alcohol can go one of two ways with me, maybe at Cana's birthday party next week we can try this again?"

This puzzled Cobra "Wasn't it her birthday today?"

"It's always Cana's birthday, she likes to make any excuse for us to party."

He was now 100% certain this guild was certifiably insane and full of drunks.

Lucy gazed up at his nose and saw the slight bruising from his fall in her apartment earlier.

"How did that happen? I hope nobody at the guild did that, I'll kick their ass. You're mine."

He snorted at her remark but ignored the way his heart skipped a beat at her saying he was hers.

"You'll kick their ass, despite the fact you hit me earlier too? No ass kicking is necessary, I fell out of the carriage just as I arrived at the guild and it's obviously only just bruised, I'll survive, I'm a strong independent man don't you know."

Turning to walk back to his new home, conveniently only about five minutes away, she grabbed his arm causing him to cringe and yank his arm away. A pained expression flashed on the celestial mage's flushed face but was quickly covered with a small smile.

"Sorry, I just want to say something before you go, I forgive you, I hope we can be friends, goodnight Erik"

He was left standing on her doorstep, trying to stop his heart from pounding right out of his chest.


	4. Chapter 4

Cobra's apartment was half the size of Lucy's and utterly disgusting. Being a slight clean freak he felt himself starting to itch looking at his bathroom, the walls were covered in damp, the toilet was, well, to him, unusable and the shower consisted of an attachment onto the tap, and no cubicle.

 _'Thank you very much magic council for this 5 star accommodation.'_ He thought sarcastically.

Finding a bottle of cheap bleach behind the toilet he took a quick sip, spitting it out onto the floor he exclaimed in disgust.

"That is the worst shitting bleach I have ever tasted in my life, some shops best be open." Marching straight back outside into the night air, he went to the shopping district to find some quality cleaning supplies to ease his creeping anxiety.

Cobra had a small amount of jewel that Master Makarov had given him to live off until he went on a mission to earn some for himself, since bleach was a poison of sorts he could clean with it and drink it.

 _'Who needs food anyway.'_

After the third place he checked, he found one that was open. His legs carried him straight to the cleaning section and he quickly filled his arms with antibacterial goodness. Dropping several disinfectants and

scrubbing brushes into his basket, he felt something vibrating against his leg. Glancing down he saw this snowman mutant looking thing making weird noises and hugging his leg. Shaking it off he stepped away "What the hell are you, get away, trust me you don't want me around you." Cobra said looking back at different bottles of bleach.

"Pun pun punnn" The weird thing said holding it's arms up in the air, as if asking for Cobra to pick it up oh hell no "Look snowman I ain't your mum, go back to where you came from." He growled at Plue causing him to start whimpering.

 _'Where the hell has that damn spirit gone, I should be fast asleep in my warm cosy bed right now, not dealing with Plue having a damn paddy because I didn't save his lollypop from earlier.'_

Cobra's ears picked up a sweet voice, one he had heard a couple of hours previous, he picked up the, what he now knew was a spirit, slowly turned around while holding him in his arms and said smoothly "Have you lost something princess?"

* * *

Lucy walked into the only shop open near her as this was where Plue always went when he was having a hissy fit as they stocked his favorite sweet that he would make her buy him to make up for upsetting him.

She hadn't managed to get any sleep, she had summoned Plue to play with, after walking back with Cobra, she wasn't even slightly buzzed anymore and after telling him she forgave him, her body flooded with adrenaline and sobered her up completely.

Almost immediately after being summoned Plue held his hands out expectantly "No Plue no lolly pop it's too late"

"Pun Punn."

"No Plue it doesn't matter what time it is in the celestial realm, you're in my realm right now and I say it's too late for a lolly, besides I don't have one for you."

Plue placed his paw on his head "Pun pun pun punn." Lucy shook her head "No I threw that lolly pop away, it had been on the floor, please don't be angry and-"

 _'Run off_.' She watched his retreating form and sighed.

"Here we go again." She pulled on a coat and trudged out the door after her spirit.

"Plue come on I don't have time to play this game, don't make me force close your gate mister." Lucy said as she walked into the shop, the clerk who was used to this happening pointed down the household cleaning section, indicating that that was where Plue was.

"Thank you, I'll pay you for whatever he's eaten." Lucy said bowing her head as she passed him and went down the aisle to see her spirit in the arms of, Erik?

' _How the hell-'_

"Have you lost something princess?" Plue squealed in fear and hid his head under Cobra's arm which caused him to drop the spirit onto his head.

"Goddammit I said stay still, now look what you made me do, you're not hurt are you? Stupid little snowman." Cobra knelt down and gently righted Plue, putting him onto his feet. Plue latched onto Cobra's hand and pulled him to his favorite part of the store.

The dragon slayer could do nothing except allow Plue to pull him along.

Once they were around the corner, Lucy peeked into his shopping basket, curious as to what he had to desperately buy at this time. Seeing it was all cleaning products she was slightly shocked and concerned for his mental health.

 _'Why the hell is he wanting to clean at this time?'_

"To answer your question, my new apartment is un-livable, I can't sleep knowing the grime monster lives in my bathroom, you wouldn't understand. I thought I sent you to bed anyway, what are you doing here?" Cobra said with Plue hugging his leg, a new lolly pop sticking out of his mouth.

Lucy sighed, pushing her messy hair out of her face.

"That little idiot decided to storm over here for a lolly because I didn't have his one from earlier, honestly it's like having a child. Goodbye Plue." She said as she sent him back to the celestial realm, this time with his lolly. "Thank you for not scaring him, he's a bit of a baby."

"Get back to bed blondie, some of us have got stuff to do ya know." Cobra mumbled gruffly, walking past her and back to his basket. She watched him bend over and appreciated the way his jeans cupped his firm-

"I can hear you, thanks for the compliment but please, don't eye fuck me in here." He smirked as he left her standing there with her mouth hanging open.

Shaking herself out of her daze she caught up to him at the doors, quickly stopping to place some jewel on the counter for Plue's sweet.

"Erik wait! Do you want to go back to yours? Maybe I can eye fuck you there a bit and we can have some fun."

"Be careful princess, you don't want to tease a snake, it's not safe." His eye twinkled with mischief as he started walking back to his apartment.

 _'And what if I **want** to tease you?'_

"Trust me, you don't."

Lucy smiled sneakily and picked up her pace so she was walking alongside the dragon slayer.

"All I meant was I would help you clean up, I was a maid once upon a time."

Slight exaggeration of the truth, she went on a mission that required her to be a maid when she first joined fairy tail, but she always used to clean Natsu's house, it couldn't be worse than that surely?

"Oh fuck, it's awful!" Lucy exclaimed when Cobra opened the door to the bathroom for her.

"I can't believe they got you a place so horrible!" laughing he said "I told you, why would you willingly come here to help someone clean that you hated not five hours ago, you can't leave now, we have a long night ahead of us sweetheart, hope you got your big girl pants on, it's going to get dirty."

* * *

Six hours had passed and they had finished the bathroom and started on the kitchen, they were both covered in grime and sweat.

Lucy was laughing, sitting on his raggedy sofa as she attempted to tell Cobra a story.

"And then he squealed like a little girl as I took a picture of him naked, it was hilarious."

"Ah so that was the dreaded picture you were threatening to show me yesterday and then blind me. I'm glad I'm on your good side now, you're quite the feisty one aren't you?"

Standing up she winked at him "This kitty has claws." Her eyes caught the time on a clock that was hanging on the wall behind Cobra and her heart hit the floor. She was late.

"Shit, I've got to get to the gym, Laxus and Gajeel are probably waiting for me, you can tag along if you want? Sweat off the rest of this mold that came from under your toilet seat, or if you want to sweat it off some other way I'm game." Her voice was full of playful banter as she began waggling her eyebrows at him.

Cobra burst out laughing at how ridiculous this girl was.

"I think i'll pass on the gym, I can't wait to sleep in an actual bed. By myself." He said pointedly.

"You might have even pulled off being sexy and convinced me on sharing it with you if you didn't keep doing that thing with your goddamn eyebrows, stop it!"

The blonde started waggling them even faster until she too burst out laughing, wiping the tears from her eyes she let out a sharp burst of air and tried to compose herself.

"Ok well you enjoy your sleep Cob- Erik, I'll be thinking of you as I'm being forced to do 100 sit ups by Gajeel, sweet dreams of my sexy ass."

"Bye Princess" He said as she watched her smack her ass as she left.

Walking into his bedroom he collapsed onto his bed, face first and screamed into his pillow. The last thing he heard her soul say as she left was running through his mind and his underwear.

 _'You can have me in your bed anytime.'_

"That damn minx still wants to have sex with me after everything I've done to her, we really did fuck her up. Good job I like my girls slightly unstable."

* * *

Quickly stopping at her house to change she ran into the guild gym and was met by the angry stares of two very unhappy dragon slayers.

She smiled innocently.

"Where the hell were you?" Laxus growled

 _'Uh oh.'_


	5. Chapter 5

Laxus slammed his hands onto his grandfather's desk causing a slight harumph to come from the old man.

"You can't seriously expect me to accept this mission? Where you drunk when you did this? Honestly Gramps, did you really think that I wouldn't notice that you had sent in this request, it's for three dragon slayers and a celestial mage."

Laxus held up his hand to silence his grandfather "yes I realize that it could have meant me, Gajeel and Natsu but what stood out the most was the little note at the bottom." He shoved the request form under his grandfather's nose as he pointed at the last line on the paper.

Enunciating each word clearly Laxus scowled as the words left lips.

"P.s one of the slayer's must have a name rhyming with Lowbra."

Makarov's face twitched as he attempted to keep a straight face.

"Son I have no idea what you're talking about, I didn't send in that request." Small choked sounds left his lips as he covered his mouth to stifle the loud guffaw that escaped.

The lightning slayer was not amused. "Look gramps I could have let it slide you letting him join but trying to get him to go on a mission with Lucy? He tried to kill her, have you no respect for your so called children?"

This took the smile right off the master of Fairy Tail's face.

"Now listen here boy, I care about you all and that is why sometimes I have to interfere. Yes Cobra has had a dark past and yes he did some bad things but so have you. He had an awful start to life, this world hasn't been as kind to him as it has to us. Everybody deserves a second chance, all they have to do is ask. Cobra has shown remorse and that is all I ask."

Laxus tried to speak but Makarov shushed him. "

Now that he is a part of this family I shall ask you this, do you not have any respect for our guild and our family? You were given a clean slate and so was Gajeel, why shouldn't he be given the same opportunity?"

 _'I hate that the old man has a point.'_ Laxus thought. Sighing heavily, he nodded in defeat.

"Alright Gramps you win, sorry I got so angry but you know how I get when it comes to Lucy, that girl's like my sister and I want to protect her, even from the past."

"Yes but if you try to protect her too much she'll never learn to heal herself. Please think about letting him come on a mission with you all. He'll need the money as well, just don't rule it out straight away. Him and Lucy might just become fast friends, I mean he did get his guild mark in the same place as hers, maybe he has a crush on her now?"

A deep frown settled on Laxus's face as he exited his grandfather's office to go talk to Gajeel and Lucy about this. See what they thought about it.

"Hey Mira, are Gajeel and Lucy here yet?" He said as he passed the white barmaid, she shook her head "I've only seen Gajeel come through, he's waiting in the gym, haven't seen Lucy since last night when she ran out after Cobra."

 _'Where the hell is that blonde idiot.'_

Laxus's mind was running a mile a minute as he walked into the weights room and looked at Gajeel.

"Is bunny not with you? Where the hell is she?" The iron slayer said gruffly, trying to not let the worry leak into his voice.

"Mira said nobody's seen her since last night when she left the guild to get Cobra, did nobody go and check on her? That psycho could've attacked her or worse!"

Both the men growled at each other "Why didn't you go check on her?"

"Well I was with Levy all night I forgot."

"It shouldn't just be up to me to look after her when she gets drunk."

A loud bag of a door closing and the smacking of feet on the concrete stairs caught their attention, a feminine voice muttered. "Fuck fuck fuck."

"Act extra mad." Gajeel whispered to Laxus as they both pulled their best angry faces as their missing blonde sister entered the room, hair wet from, what they hoped, was a recent shower and clothes haphazardly put on.

Glancing up at the dragon slayers she saw their rather unhappy looking faces and pulled her most angelic smile. Sadly for her, it didn't work on them. Laxus was the first to break the silence.

"Where the hell were you?"

* * *

Lucy knew she was in trouble now. She probably reeked of Cobra and to top it off she was late.

"Well guys you see I spent the night with my good friend Erik." This caused both the dragon slayers angry faces to be replaced with their extremely confused faces.

Gajeel rubbed his head "Who the hell is Erik? Don't tell me you were late today because you were getting laid? Yes then Bunny girl." He held up his hand for a high five which he slowly retracted when Laxus gave him a death glare.

"Shut the hell up Gajeel." Laxus turned back to face Lucy, he looked at her disapprovingly "Don't tell me you had sex with some randomer, you're better than that."

Lucy scoffed. "Laxus I may be untouched in the hymen department but certainly not in the boy department, please don't treat me like a child, Erik is just a friend, someone I know outside the guild. I, er, helped him clean his house last night." She wasn't technically lying.

"That's what friends are for, I always used to clean Natsu's house, I lost track of time so I had to rush home, shower and change. Nothing happened I promise. Calm the big brother act and hug me."

She held her arms out. "Also I am very hungover so you should be proud I still showed up"

Practically smothering her in a bear hug, Laxus rubbed his knuckles on her head causing her already messy hair to become extremely static because of his lightning magic.

Squealing in protest she tried to wriggle out of his grasp "Laxus let go of me you giant penis! My hair won't calm down for days, stop it!"

Gajeel watched them both with a evil smirk on his face, waiting for the right time to strike. Finally letting her go, the blonde man laughed at her appearance. With a heavily flushed face and messy hair she was a picture.

' _Speaking of pictures.'_ Gajeel leapt in between them both and snapped a very unflattering photo of Lucy

"Gihihi now we're even bunny!" The black haired man shouted as he tried to run away but was caught by her whip, dragging him onto the floor. A fight between all three of them ensued that lasted all morning, leaving them all cut up, bruised but satisfied nonetheless.

They all sat on the floor against the wall of the gym catching their breath.

Lucy laughed "Well that burnt off any frustration I had, no gym session needed." Both the men laughed and agreed.

Laxus cleared his throat and decided to speak up about the situation his grandfather had spoke to him about.

"Hey blondie, if theoretically I asked if you would come on a mission with me, Gajeel and Cobra, how against the idea would you be?" Her answer shocked him.

"I'd be totally up for it, when do we leave?" She smirked at him "I'm all up for being in a triple slayer sandwich."

* * *

Several hours later in a train carriage there were three slayers, one whose name rhymed with Lowbra, one celestial mage and a hell of a lot of hostility.

Lucy tried to diffuse the situation before Gajeel tore out Cobra's throat and Laxus cheered him on.

"So guys, dragon slayers huh, crazy how rare you guys are and I get three of you in one compartment, someone pinch me huh? Ow not literally Gajeel, you idiot."

The pierced male shrugged his shoulders, plucked Laxus's sound pop off his neck, slid it onto his head and closed his eyes, deciding that sleeping was better than trying to converse with anyone, especially since his motion sickness was starting to kick in.

Looking over to Laxus who had a face like thunder, that was also starting to go slightly green, she decided that getting rid of him was her only option to make them all happy.

"Hey Laxus fancy going to grab me a bottle of water? Go stretch your legs and while you're at it your smiling muscles, it takes 62 muscles to frown but only 26 to smile. Bear that in mind."

She tried to sound stern, it seemed to work as he stood up and trudged to the canteen compartment of the train.

She turned to look at the only remaining slayer, her brown eyes twinkling. "And then there were two. How have you been Erik?"

* * *

 _Why did I agree to this.'_

 _'Who the hell thought this was a good idea.'_

 _'Erik looks so yummy in those jeans, I can practically see little Erik through them, maybe if I look harder it might get harder.'_

Cobra was only happy to hear the last thought, the other two not so much. Gajeel and Laxus were questioning why they had come on the mission, Lucy was just enjoying the ride. Now that the lightening slayer had left and the iron slayer was asleep with his ears covered it was just him and the sexy blonde who was currently shuffling closer to him with her body guards now out of the way.

"Can we have some fun now?" She said as she practically crawled onto his lap, which caused him to get freaked out by the close contact, gently pushing her back onto the seat, he hopped over to the other side of the carriage.

"Look Luce, it's nothing against you but please stop invading my personal space, I don't feel so hot right now and I have a bubble that should never be breached. If you get hurt it's not my fault, you've been warned."

She pouted and placed her head against the window of the train, waiting until they arrived at their destination. Deciding that she didn't want to be covered in vomit she gave up for the time being, which cobra was very thankful for.

 _'Stupid sexy man turning me down all the time.'_

Laughing in his head at the blonde's constant sexual thoughts he tried to tune her out and think about the mission, from what the maroon haired man knew, it was relatively easy.

Take out some monsters that were terrorizing a village, it wasn't something that would require three high level dragon slayers and one incredibly powerful celestial mage. But the money it was offering for its completion was something he couldn't turn down or question in his current situation. He needed the money.

Once the train had stopped Cobra stumbled onto the platform, closely followed by Laxus who was just as wobbly but trying to put on a brave face whereas Gajeel was being lead off by Lucy and her spirit Virgo as he was struggling to support himself.

"I'm fine bunny, you're embarrassing me!" Gajeel insisted but as soon as he struggled out of their grip he hit the floor with a fleshy smack.

Lucy barked out a laugh and patted her spirits arm.

"Thank you Virgo you can go back now, this idiot doesn't need our help." The pink haired maid bowed to her master and vanished. Cobra had always appreciated how special those spirits were but his old guild mate Angel never had, she treated them like shit, so he treated her like shit.

He firmly believed that you have to give respect to gain respect. This way of thinking hadn't failed him yet.

Lucy walked ahead of the three men and bounced excitedly which drew Cobra's eyes to her large breasts that were also bouncing.

 _'He's checking me out aw how cute.'_

 _'Dammit she doesn't miss a thing.'_ Cobra thought, blushing slightly as he looked at the blonde girl who was currently winking at him.

 _'I'll get you soon enough big boy.'_

"The village is just up ahead, race you there." Lucy sped past Laxus and raced up the hill, excited to fight some monsters. Laughing, Laxus ran along with her, but stopped dead in his tracks when he saw what lay ahead.

"What the hell are those things?" He said in shock. There were about twenty weird dog looking things except they had two heads and were covered in spikes instead of fur.

Lucy yanked her whip from her hip, a smile already on her face.

"They're hell hounds, someone has obviously manifested them, been unable to control the beasts and ran away, leaving them to harass the village. We just need to kill them as fast as possible. They'll know we're here soon. But most importantly, remember to have fun boys."

She ran into the middle of the field, whip in hand and summoned her spirit Taurus.

 _'She really does love to fight.'_

Laxus looked at Cobra as he ran after Lucy.

"Don't fuck this up, this is your second chance."


	6. Chapter 6

_'It looks like she's dancing.'_ Cobra observed as he watched Lucy fight off the last one of their enemies. She spun around gracefully, her whip was wrapped around one of the beast's throats.

She smiled as she pulled it sharply and a loud crack came from the hound as it's neck was snapped. She shouted for Taurus to cut off the remaining one, which he did with ease considering the size of his giant axe. The blood splattered all up Lucy, not that she noticed, she had her eyes closed as she sighed happily.

 _'I did it.'_ he heard her soul say, almost at peace with itself.

"Moo I'm so sorry Miss Lucy, you're covered in that mutts blood." Taurus bowed before her as he shimmered and then disappeared back to his own realm.

Cobra watched in slow motion as a hell hound snuck out from behind a rock, heading towards Lucy. It's twin sets of jaws opening, ready to take her life.

The other two dragon slayers were too far away to get to her in time, without having a chance to even think, his feet took him to her. He pushed Lucy out of the way as the animal's maw clamped onto his forearm, instead of the blonde that was currently on the floor, staring in shock at him.

As one head held his arm the other went for his throat, taking advantage of his immobility. He managed to dodge it enough so it's sharpened canines didn't fully penetrate his flesh but he still felt the sting as it raked over his neck.

Roaring in pain, he froze in fear, he had no idea what to do now, this thing had him pinned, he couldn't do his poison roar as Lucy was directly in front of him and she would get caught in it. His poison was more potent than anything in this world.

His heart went into overdrive, unable to calm down he started to have a panic attack.

'P _lease not now.'_ he thought to himself as he scrunched his face up and waited for the bite.

 _'Shove your hand in it's mouth and pour poison down it's throat, you can corrode it from the inside out, do it Erik.'_

Shocked at her calm thoughts, he glanced down at Lucy and managed to smile, taking a deep breath he prepared himself.

"Loud and clear blondie, hold your breath just incase some seeps out, it's powerful shit."

She nodded at him and took a deep breath, getting the all clear from her he yanked the mouth on his arm open and shoved his scale covered arm in, secreting his poison particles, he could hear the sizzling as it went down it's throat and dripped onto it's internal organs.

The beast screeched and released cobra, thrashing violently as it started to bubble from the inside.

"Lucy, run now, I'm going to blast it with my roar." He shouted at the blonde as she ran in the direction of Laxus and Gajeel.

Looking down at the pitiful creature he frowned.

"Sorry about this bud." then he released his poison dragon roar that wiped any trace of the hell hound from this world, completely melting it away. Cobra had to cover his overly sensitive nose from the horrific stench it had left behind.

"Smells like burnt ass hair, nice work though." He felt a solid hand land on his shoulder, jumping slightly he turned to see a slightly ruffled Gajeel, grinning at him.

Before he could respond Lucy came running over and tackled him to the floor.

"You saved me thank you so much Eri- Cobra! Drinks are on me when we get to the hotel." She declared as she held him to the floor. Wincing slightly at the pressure on his arm he realized the hell hound had actually done some damage to him which wasn't healing in the slightest.

Gently pushing Lucy onto her side he examined her body for any cuts or scrapes from the beasts. Damn she was all woman. Her outfit had torn slightly revealing even more skin on her chest. You could see the white lace of her bra.

' _Oh wow.'_

"You shouldn't wear such skimpy clothes when you know you're going into battle, you'll get injured more easily." He said disapprovingly trying to disguise his obvious desire for the little spitfire. Why else would he risk his life for her?

"A tiny little skirt and crop top is not appropriate, you got lucky today."

Lucy huffed "You got lucky too, being able to see me like this in action, it's easier to move in this stuff anyway, you should try it sometime instead of wearing all those layers. Don't you think I look nice Cobra?"

 _'I know you do, I felt that little snake in your pants.'_

Shuffling away from the little black widow for his own safety he heard Laxus chuckle, announcing his presence.

"Stop teasing him Lucy, he just saved your life, you owe the guy one of your special slayer cakes. Poison a la Lucy." This peaked Cobra's interest.

"Slayer cake?" He asked, keeping his face uninterested, trying to seem nonchalant.

Lucy huffed standing up and wiping herself down.

"Yeah I make Gaj and Laxus special element cakes when they've been especially good, I suppose I could whip you up something for saving my life." she said "What specific poison did you want in it? Do you have one you love the taste of or one that gives you a good little power up?"

Cobra smirked and listed several to keep her busy, he wanted this cake to be extra tasty as he couldn't remember the last time he had eaten his element in food, actually prepared for him.

"Well A sprinkle of ground up hemlock, add a splash of bleach and a bit of cyanide and then anything else you think might spruce it up a bit, thank you."

She made a mental list but her eyes went wide when she saw Cobra's arm that he was holding protectively against his side "Oh my gosh did that hell hound do that to you? It looks really bad, we need to get back to Wendy straight away, it's starting to turn your skin black. They carry a specific toxin in their saliva that kills the oxygen in your blood cells, it's rotting away your flesh too."

Lucy ripped off a section of her skirt, exposing even more of her skin and tried to wipe away some of the excess blood to try and clean the wound.

"Laxus, Gajeel will you two be able to go to the person who posted the mission and get the reward money? I'm going back to the guild with Cobra, he needs to see Wendy and Porlyusica, this shit will go through his system quite quick so we need to go now." She dragged Cobra to his feet, dragging him behind her as they started running back the way they came.

"Yeah bye then!" Gajeel shouted after them sarcastically.

They ran all the way back to the train station, Lucy didn't calm down until they were sat on the train, on the way back to magnolia. She made Cobra lie down on the seat opposite her. He sighed, irritated at her concern.

"Lucy it's fine, I feel fine. We didn't need to leave those guys, I'm a poison dragon slayer, my body will just absorb the venom that they pumped into me."

He realized his words were starting to slur slightly and his vision was starting to blacken

 _'What the hell is happening to me.'_

He reached his hand over to Lucy and held hers to try and steady his shaky vision, he lost consciousness as she called his name.

* * *

"Erik? Oh shit no, Erik wake up please! You can't sleep now we need to go to the guild and fix you!" Lucy moaned out as she knelt next to him, holding his hand as she stroked his hair off his clammy forehead. He was out cold and the poison in his arm was spreading fast, the black like tendrils were reaching up for his heart.

Panicking, she summoned Loke, she needed help, he was always there when she needed him and despite the way he acted, he was actually quite intelligent, he might know what to do.

Her loyal lion appeared in the train carriage and was immediately kneeling before Cobra, his hands on his forearm inspecting the wound.

"I hope that isn't your blood covering you princess, I'm not going to question why you're here alone with this oracion seis scum, I'm sure it's a long story you'll tell me in the future, right now I'll help you help him. He's been bitten by a hell hound hasn't he?"

Lucy nodded, tears in her eyes as she stared at the maroon haired man whose color was rapidly leaving his face, he looked like a ghost. Nothing like his normal vibrant self.

' _This isn't fair.'_ she thought angrily. 'H _e's just been given a second chance, he was getting on great, we were getting on great and now he's dying because of me.'_

"Is there anything we can do Loke? I can't let him die, he just saved my life, I need to save his! Help me save him." she groaned as Cobra started crying out in pain which alarmed Loke.

"It shouldn't be this far along yet, I'll pump some of my regulus magic inside his wound, it might burn off some of the poison and give us the time we need to get him to the guild." Loke quickly pushed his finger into the wound, his magic pulsed throughout the bite causing the smell of burnt flesh to fill the compartment.

"Dude that stinks, has it worked?" Lucy said, slightly nasally as she held her nose closed as to not inhale the smell.

"My princess we need to get him to the guild now, he's stable but his poison isn't reacting well with my light or the hell hound's toxins, there's like a mini war going on in his body right now and his organs are taking a beating from it." Loke sighing heavily and wiped his bloody hands onto his suit trousers.

"I've slowed it down but it didn't like me intruding and burnt me as well." He held up his finger which was slightly singed.

The blonde mage bent forward and kissed his finger. "All better." She said which caused Loke to almost fall over from excitement at being touched intimately by his master.

He was about to gush about how soft her lips were when Cobra started mumbling incoherently. Lucy leant closer to his body and listened carefully. She could only make out one thing that made sense and it caused her cheeks to burn intensely.

"My little fairy, Lucy."


	7. Chapter 7

_'This is so fucked up.'_ Cobra was currently walking through a pink orchard and the trees had gummy bears growing on them for fuck sake. He must be off his face on something.

This was definitely not real. A small rustle behind him made his steps falter.

"Look I really am not in the mood for this, if this is a dream or probably a nightmare would describe it better, if I turn around and look at what's behind me right now, there will be some really fucked up shit there, like Midnight naked or Angel with a penis. Please cut me some slack."

 _'Oh shit no please don't be Angel at all, I'm thinking about it, it's going to appear now, Cobra stop.'_

He started hitting his head with his palms as if to smack the image out of his head.

Feeling satisfied that is old guild mate wasn't going to appear he slowly pivoted his body towards the noise. "Oh hell no." He groaned as he spun right back around and walked in the opposite direction.

"Erik please don't leave, I'm here to help." The feminine voice drifted to his ears as he marched away.

"Lucy, well obviously not Lucy, I know that isn't you and do you want to tell you why?" He held his hand in the air and raised his middle finger at her, keeping his back to the weirdly attractive looking imposter "One, you have fucking fairy wings" He raised another hand and raised his other middle finger.

"And two, you have three breasts. Now fuck off"

"Erik you will never leave this place if you do not listen to me. I may not be the Lucy you know but I am how you want her to look."

Cobra snorted at her, this girl looked like a fly fucked a cow and put a picture of Lucy on it's face. He liked Lucy just the way she was, she didn't need to change anything about herself, not a thing. She was perfect.

He finally decided to face the figment of his imagination and poison her for insinuating such a ridiculous thing. He was surprised but also majorly relieved to see that it looked normal now. No more fairy wings, just soft curves and two regular looking breasts, just the way he liked them. Perky and attached to Lucy.

 _'There she is'_ he thought.

"My little fairy, Lucy" he spoke softly as she did a little curtsy and smiled "Now where do I need to go to get to the real version of you sweetheart?"

With a smile as sickly sweet as syrup the fake Lucy pointed upwards, where a huge rainbow was projected in the sky "At the end of the rainbow is where you will find your treasure, your figurative pot of gold." Holding out her hand she waited for Cobra to take it so they could start their journey.

He looked down at her open palm, it looked like Lucy and even smelled like Lucy but it was just missing something. Sighing he begrudgingly grasped her hand which caused a little happy squeal to leave her lips.

"Of course it's at the end of the fucking rainbow, am I in a kids book or some shit? Alright whatever princess, let's get me home, I want my special cake your ass offered me."

* * *

The real Lucy was sat in the train carriage with Loke as she watched Cobra's face very carefully for any signs of consciousness, he sounded almost awake when he said _**that**._ She shot a venomous glare at Loke who was currently rolling on the floor laughing at what Cobra had just mumbled.

 _'What the hell did he mean, my little fairy? I'm nobody's fairy, I'm vicious and i'm most certainly not little.'_

"Cobra I'm going to kick your skinny little ass, if this is just a prank you're playing on me this is so not funny. I knew you could absorb poison, you're fine aren't you?"

She poked his cheek, when she didn't get a response she scoffed. "I saw you flinch idiot, I know you can hear me. If you don't cut this out I'll cut off your little python in your trousers."

Still no response.

 _'Alright don't say I didn't warn you'_

Ignoring Loke's protests of having to see another dragon slayers penis, she continued reaching into Cobra's trousers, sliding her hands down his pelvis he still hadn't reacted.

'H _e's got a great poker face.'_ She lifted up the waist of his jeans and gasped, she could see him clearly through his boxers, did she say python? She should've said a bloody anaconda, it was huge.

The admiration of his member was short lived as she burst out laughing at his choice of underwear. It was covered with cartoon snakes. How adorable.

Her eyes traveled up his body and fixed on his hand. His glove had slightly come off revealing the edge of what she assumed was a tattoo. Curiosity eating away at her she gently pulled it off his hand. She dropped it on the floor when she saw what it actually was.

"He got his guild mark in the same place as mine?" She whispered, unsure if it was creepy or sweet. Or just done to annoy her. Either way it made her heart flutter.

Cobra jolted forward, scaring the crap out of Lucy in the process and causing a. "Aha I knew it." but she shut up as soon as he spewed up a black liquid all over her top. Realizing that he actually was still unconscious and his condition was rapidly deteriorating she flew at Loke, completely ignoring the dark fluid on her top.

"Loke you need to get to the guild now, I'll suffer the consequences if you get in trouble for this but you need to take him through the celestial realm and transport to the guild. I will owe you big time." She practically begged him which he couldn't refuse.

Picking up the sick dragon slayer he threw him over his shoulder and winked "You will owe me big Luce, see you later princess" and then he was gone.

Collapsing onto the train seat she exhaled a shuddery breath and let her eyes fall shut.

"Please fix him." she whispered to the empty compartment as she tried and failed to hold back tears for the poor man who had no one else to cry for him.

* * *

Loke didn't really care if Cobra survived the trip through the celestial realm or even at all but his master did, so he would do whatever he could to ensure his survival. Once they had passed through and arrived at the guildhall, Cobra seemed to be in the same condition, luckily it hadn't gotten any worse.

He rushed him over to bar where Mira was sitting with Wendy.

 _'Just my luck, he might survive after all.'_

Loke dropped his limp body on the counter, ignoring everyone's greetings and winked at Wendy "Hey cutie pie, fancy taking pity on this little reptile and fixing him up for my princess?"

Wendy gasped looking down at Cobra, the black from his bite had spread all up his arm and his neck. His face was deathly pale and his lips were turning blue. She held her hands above his body, a warm glow radiating from them. The onyx fluid started to come out of his skin in droplets and created a ball in Wendy's hands. Mira rushed to get a cup for it to fall into.

Sweat droplets were forming on the young blue haired girl's forehead as she strained for her magic to get the last few remnants out of Cobra's body.

Loke was absolutely fascinated at the amazing skill a girl so young had, Cobra looked almost completely healed. His face had gained a small amount of color, nowhere near his usual complexion but better than before.

Releasing the black orb of poison, Wendy relaxed her body, allowing the liquid to splash into the cup which got covered up by Mira and taken away to be safely disposed of.

"Wendy you are a literal lifesaver, Lucy will be so grateful."

"Lu- Lucy?" Cobra moaned out, his hand reaching for someone that wasn't there, causing everyone to look at him and wonder why he was calling for their celestial mage. Someone he had attempted to kill in cold blood in the past and who had been threatening to kill him not even two days ago?

* * *

Cobra's eyes shot open, slightly disoriented he looked around at the unfamiliar surroundings he started to panic.

 _'Where the hell am I, I'm not in that crazy ass forest anymore with fake Lucy. I'd made it to the end of the rainbow, now where the fuck am I and where is the real Lucy?'_

Cobra growled menacingly, his implanted dragon instincts kicking in, everyone's thoughts were deafening, he needed to get out of here, get to Lucy's house to get his prize. It would be quiet there and safe.

"Hey man it's Loke, Lucy is-"

Not waiting for him to finish he pushed the stranger off of him and ran out of the building he was being kept in, inspecting it as he ran out he realized he was at Fairy Tail's guild hall. Why wasn't Lucy there?

 _'She doesn't care about you asshole, why would she be there?'_

"Shut up" he growled at his internal voice. It was like he had two people inside one body. One extremely negative and poisonous personality that gave him nothing positive, just anxiety and a bad temper.

The other side of him was caring and loving but being kept as a slave in the tower of heaven for most of his life and then being in a dark guild didn't really give him much need for a more soft hearted side. He needed to be strong, not weak.

Stumbling along, Cobra winced as his arm started aching, pulling his sleeve up he noticed that all the black toxins had been taken out, probably by Fairy Tail's healer Wendy.

He'd need to thank her for saving his life when he saw he next but it still hurt like a bitch, they may have pumped a lethal amount of whatever the hell it was into him but they packed a nasty bite too. His arm wouldn't feel right for a long time.

"Where the hell is my glove." he moaned glancing down at his hand he was missing his glove that covered his guild mark, he kind of regretted getting in the same place as Lucy.

He would be massively embarrassed if she ever saw it, she would think he was some sort of stalker or something probably. _'Yeah like she's not going to think that when you show up at her house'_ he thought sarcastically.

Seeing a sign for Lucy's street he smiled weakly, he was almost there. Knocking on her front door he waited impatiently, _'what am I going to say when she opens the door? Crap I didn't think this through.'_ He listened for her soul but couldn't sense it.

She wasn't at the guild but she must be in Magnolia, how else would she have gotten him here?

Turning the handle he was surprised to see that it opened without any resistance, walking inside he collapsed to his knees, he was fighting a losing battle. "Honey I'm home." he muttered as he collapsed on her fluffy carpet _'at least it's comfortable and not cold, score one for me.'_

* * *

"That train ride was ridiculously bad, why did that creep have to come sit next to me." Lucy muttered as she waved goodbye to Ichiya, who had insisted on sitting with her when he had stumbled into her train compartment, he literally fell through the doors.

He was currently blowing kisses from the window as the train pulled away.

 _'Thank Mavis that's over, the man gives me the creeps.'_

Running to the guild hall her stomach was full of knots, was Cobra going to be dead on the floor? Or was he going to be spewing poison at everyone for getting too close? Who knows. Standing at the guild's doors she stopped to compose herself but was almost run over by Loke who looked extremely panicked.

When he saw Lucy he stopped dead in his tracks and fell to his knees, wrapping his arms around her legs and sobbed. "Princess I am so sorry"

Her stomach dropped _'He's dead oh no.'_

She closed her eyes and tears fell down her face.

"Don't cry Lucy please I promise we'll find him, he can't have gotten far." Loke voice was slightly muffled as his face was pressed in her crotch.

 _'Wait what, find him?'_

Wiping the tears from her face, she scowled and slapped Loke's head away.

"You idiot he's not dead? Why did you make me think he was? Are you a moron? What the hell happened Loke?"

He looked up at her pitifully "It was all going fine, Wendy healed him as much as she could, she got all of the poison out of his system but he was still quite damaged from the effects of it all and just the physical trauma of the bite itself but he woke up saying your name and then just ran off, he was heading in the direction of your house, that's where I was about to go check."

Trying not to show her anxiousness at the thought of finding Erik waiting at her house for her she nodded at Loke.

"Okay no that's fine Loke, you've done great, I really do appreciate your help, but you can go back to the celestial realm now, I don't think you or anybody else coming with me to see him would be a good idea, he has a really bad time with strangers near him, he doesn't even like me near him and I'm probably the closest thing to a friend he has here. I'll let you know how it goes later okay?"

She placed her hand on his shoulder and smiled. "Trust me" As he disappeared he laughed "You best tell me how it goes, I want all the gossip. See you soon princess."

Avoiding going into the guild hall as she didn't want to have to explain this to anyone just yet she hightailed it to her apartment. She looked up at her window but couldn't see any lights on or any movement coming from inside, she just hoped and prayed that Cobra was going to be there so she could look after him.

It's the least she could do since it was her fault this happened. Sneaking up the stairs she saw her door was slightly ajar, debating on whether it was Erik or a robber she stuck her head through the door, whip in hand. Looking at the floor she sighed with a smile on her face.

"There you are Erik, came home to mumma didn't you."

Kneeling on the floor she examined his face, his good eye was shut. He looked very peaceful. Staring at him she looked at his plump lips and just couldn't resist. Slowly bending down she pressed a gentle kiss on them, they tasted just as she imagined, sweet like honey. She pressed against them slightly harder, trying to get a response. A small moan came from the unconscious man but nothing more. Laughing against his lips she gave him one more soft peck and then rested her forehead against his.

"I can't get you out of my head Erik, you're like a poison inside of me that I don't want to get rid of, it's scary."

Grasping her table she pulled herself up, looking at the sofa and then back at Erik, she debated on if she was going to be able to get him there by herself. Laxus's words echoed in her head.

 _'You're a strong girl blondie, you just need a bit of a kick.'_ Well if stopping a sleeping man drooling on her very expensive carpet wasn't a kick to get him moved then nothing would be.

Taking a deep breath, she grabbed Erik by the waist and slung his body in her arms. _'Oh my Mavis he weighs so much, how is he so skinny yet so fat.'_ Shuffling across her apartment, it felt like she had done a marathon in just a few meters.

She chucked his body onto her sofa and took a few deep breaths.

"You fat fuck Erik you almost broke my back." she panted out.

Stumbling over to her kitchen, Lucy poured two glasses of water and wet a piece of cloth to place on Cobra's forehead, she couldn't leave him to go wash herself until she knew he was healthy enough to be left alone for a bit.

Plus if she left him in here he'd probably end up waking up and walking in on her in the bath somehow, everybody else managed to so she sucked it up and tried to ignore the fact that she was covered in blood and vomit.

Putting the cold piece of cloth on Erik's head you could practically see steam coming off him from how high his temperature was.

She decided to stay on the same sofa to keep a close eye on him she settled in on the end, gently resting his head on her lap. She stroked her fingers through his hair, Laxus and Gajeel always found this soothing whenever they felt sick and made her do it until her fingers cramped.

 _'Those assholes.'_

Flicking through the lacrima TV she settled on a documentary on reptiles, this particular one was about all the different species of snakes, as soon as it mentioned anacondas she started snickering thinking of Cobra's penis, that was it's new name.

She was fascinated and interested by all animals but Reptiles the most because they were so different from every other animal and they were, in her eyes, the most beautiful.

She felt herself drifting off as the narrator of the program lulled her to sleep as well, leaving her fingers tangled in Erik's hair she let herself be sucked under into a, hopefully, dreamless sleep.


	8. Chapter 8

"Would you shut up about Levy fucking McGarden you moron, I have a headache and I really don't need this right now." Laxus growled at his fellow dragon slayer Gajeel Redfox, they were sat in a carriage bound for magnolia.

They dwarfed the inside of the carriage not leaving much room for any privacy or space away from each other so Laxus had no choice but to tell him to shut up. It was the middle of the night now and the only transport available was a carriage.

It cost double the jewel but it was still cheaper than renting a room. Gajeel stuck his middle finger up at Laxus "Levy is a wonderful little woman, you're just jealous."

Laxus fixed him with an incredulous stare. "I'm jealous because I'm not a wonderful little woman?" Gajeel's eyes bugged out of his head realizing his choice of words "No you idiot that's not what I meant, Mavis you're annoying, no wonder I got a mate before any of you idiots."

Laxus chuckled as he teased his friend, he made it way too easy sometimes.

"Do you think that Lucy is Cobra's mate?" Gajeel snorted a laugh out "Yeah good one, those two being mated for life, they wouldn't last five minutes without her cutting off the tops of his ears and making him eat them."

A thoughtful look crossed the iron slayer's face as he raised a studded eyebrow.

"Although she has seemed to forgive him rather quickly. They sure do seem to like each other at the moment, a little bit too much if you know what I mean."

Realization slapped Gajeel in the face, gasping in shock, he pointed at Laxus accusingly.

"Oh you dick, they _are_ mates aren't they? How long have you known, you idiotic lightning rod? Why didn't you tell me. I could've stopped them from going off earlier, they're probably having crazy animal sex in a ditch somewhere."

 _'If the poor guy is still alive that is.'_ Laxus thought sadly. He didn't really like the guy but seeing him save Lucy earlier was a bit of an eye opener.

* * *

 _ **"The Boa Constrictor has one of the most distinctive marking on it's body out of all the reptile world, they can grow up for 13 Ft long and weigh more than 45 kilograms."**_

Cobra rolled onto his side, placing a hand on his pounding head he felt something dry and crispy stuck to it, pulling the bone dry cloth away and dropping it on the floor, he groaned loudly _'how the hell did I get home'_ He looked at the ceiling and made a decision.

This definitely wasn't his house, the lacrima television on the desk opposite him wasn't his despite it playing the only show that he ever watched on it. Glancing down at his body he noticed that he was also wrapped up in a pink fluffy blanket.

 _'This shit certainly isn't mine.'_

Picking up the offending piece of material he slung it over the back of the sofa and sighed in relief at the cool air that was now able to reach his scorching hot skin. Something slumped on the floor below him grumbling unhappily.

His eyes were struggling to adjust to the dim lighting but he could make out a head of blonde hair resting on the floor with the attached body spread eagle on the carpet.

"Dammit can you stop pushing me off the sofa all the time Laxus, my poor bum isn't going to recover one of these days."

Lucy sat up and let out a puff of air, turning her head to face Cobra she let out an ear piercing shriek directly in his face causing him to hurry to cover his super sensitive ears.

Gasping in pain at the sudden movement, he had yanked his injured arm a bit too hard causing the healing skin to tear open again. "You're not Laxus" she stated matter of factly

 _'Oh yeah I remember now.'_ her soul said, calming down slightly.

Lucy smiled sheepishly as she glanced up at the poison dragon slayer "Sorry Erik I forgot you were here. How are you feeling?"

 _'Sexually frustrated I hope. I can fix that.'_

"I'm in too much pain to be horny right now sweetheart. How about running to grab me a towel? I would hate to get blood all over your pretty little sofa." Cobra said gruffly, trying to hide the amount of pain he was truly in.

It's not that he felt like he had to hide it from her. He just didn't want her to feel guilty about what had happened. It wasn't her fault that he had gotten injured. He had made the decision to jump in between her and certain death.

Cobra knew that he would never be able to make up for all the wrongs he had dealt her but he could try, saving her life was a good start.

Lucy had shuffled over to the kitchen, she grabbed a tea towel and ran back. Roughly wrapping it around his arm she winced "That looks really nasty Erik, I am so-"

Cobra held his uninjured arm up to shush her "Don't want to hear it, no apologies are going to come out of your lips. Now shut up and let's watch tv." With his arm now bound up, albeit very shoddily, he lifted it above the sofa so Lucy could snuggle into his body, which she did happily.

Resting her head on his shoulder she let out a shuddery breath "You really scared me back there Erik, don't ever do that again." Lucy slapped his chest gently. Cobra chuckled softly "Yeah okay I won't save your life again, I'll make sure to remember that in the future princess."

"Yeah you better." She muttered under her breath. Her hands started to run down his arm, gently touching her fingers over the scars circling his wrist, he held his breath. Waiting for her to exclaim in disgust. Or say anything at all but she didn't.

She just continued to lightly trace the silvery ribbons of disfigured skin, almost as if she were trying to knit it back together for him. For the first time since he had been given them, they didn't hurt or ache. He didn't feel ashamed for having them.

"You don't have to tell me about them but you shouldn't be ashamed of them and cover them with gloves. Wear them like a badge of honor, you survived whatever pain you endured. Those marks will never let you forget that and that's an amazing thing." She smirked.

"Also I love where you decided to get your guild mark, it's a very original idea."

A gentle blush dusted his cheeks "Well I am known for my originality, you shouldn't copy people Lucy."

Shocked at her timing, Cobra watched as Lucy pulled her shorts down slightly, about to scold her for always thinking with her hormones he went to pull it back up but stopped when he saw what she was trying to show him.

His mouth fell open. Along the line of her pelvis was a long jagged scar "There was a messed up fight that ended up in me almost getting killed. The guy damn near pulled out my cervix." She winced at the memory.

Cobra leant down and placed a soft kiss on the scar just below her naval. "You're amazing too y'know."

They both settled back onto the sofa, hands placed on each others secret wounds and continued watching the lacrima reptile show like the insane day they had both had was nothing but a bad dream.

"Did you know I have a snake?" Lucy whispered into Cobra's neck. _'She had a snake? Where?'_

Feeling a bubble of excitement settle in his stomach he was extremely disappointed when she grabbed his junk and exclaimed that she had caught an anaconda.

Shuffling away from her he sighed smiling. "You're an idiot, do you know that? A crazy lovable idiot though."

 _'I'm your idiot.'_ she thought quietly but loud enough for his magic to hear. Cobra kept every sweet thought of hers he had ever heard tucked safely away in his heart, saving them for a rainy day when he needed a smile.

* * *

The gym was getting more and more full each morning. Ever since Cobra had started to come with her to her morning session, a couple of new girls appeared out of nowhere to watch him.

It was annoying. They had been coming for a week now and had shown no signs of doing any exercise. Just standing there drooling. At least when Lucy was admiring him she was sweating her ass off at the same time.

Lucy scowled at two unknown mages, if they wanted to join fairy tail they were going the wrong way about it. "Laxus don't let them join, if you do I'll make them leave. Don't underestimate me, I'll make them leave screaming."

She was doing push ups as Laxus did a set of squats while holding her legs. The anger was spurring her on to do more which caused her arms to get a deep ache in them that she would surely be complaining about later on. Keeping her eyes trained on the girls eyeing up Cobra as he was working out, she'd decided enough was enough.

Doing a forward roll out of Laxus's grasp, she could hear him warning her as she marched towards the two woman.

"Blondie don't do anything stupid, please"

Lucy rolled her eyes at her brother, pulled her trainer off and chucked it at one of the girls trying to touch her man's bicep.

The shoe hit the girl's nose causing her to squeak in pain "Oh my gosh what the hell." she shouted, Cobra glowered at the loud noise, just realizing that someone was near him.

Lucy pulled off the other shoe and threatened to throw it too.

"Get away you little cockroaches, I'll beat the shit out of you if you ever come here again, the guys in here are not eye candy for your filthy little minds now fuck off."

Cobra, Gajeel and Laxus stared at her in shock, not at all expecting her to flip out over something so small.

When the girls made no signs of moving she threw her other shoe and pulled out her whip from the strap on her leg.

"You want to play a game of Lucy vs the pests then huh? Let's play." She smiled sadistically as she cracked her whip and lunged for them.


	9. Chapter 9

Watching Lucy lose her shit over some girls drooling over him made Cobra feel very smug, he smirked as he walked behind her as she chased the two mages out of the gym, threatening to summon her most fearsome spirit, probably slightly exaggerating a little for effect.

"I'll summon Plue, I swear to Mavis, don't ever come back or he'll be here waiting," She cracked her whip which caught one of the legs of the girls causing a squeal to leave her mouth.

"My man doesn't like pigs." Lucy shouted, which resulted in a slammed door from the retreating mages and howling laughter coming from inside the gym.

Cobra felt a swell of pride in his chest at how far Lucy was willing to go just because someone was looking at him. Having never had anyone even remotely interested in him for his personality and not just his reputation as a dark mage, it was a shock. He didn't want it to end, ever.

Lucy strutted back into the room and gave Laxus a high five "Yeah you're welcome boys, it's always me that had to take out the trash." She pushed Cobra down so he was sat on the floor and slumped into his lap, leaning her head back against his neck "You need to get ugly so I'm the only one that notices you, I can't be doing that everyday."

"What's going on between you two?" Gajeel said inquisitively, taking a sip from a bottle of water, his question was simple enough but Cobra could hear what his soul was thinking and it was much more complicated.

 _'I wonder if they really are mates, they sure are alike, what just happened kind of proves they're more than friends, go bunny.'_

Lucy's soul was just making him laugh.

 _'Dammit can we go take a shower Erik? I'm all sweaty, you can soap me up. I know you can hear me stop ignoring me dickhead, I hate you.'_

"We're fuck buddies Gaj, is that cool? I hope you both approve, I mean you guys are like family, I wouldn't want you to not approve of my sexual partner who penetrates me four times a day, at least. If you look closely at us we're actually having sex right now." Ending this with a long orgasmic moan she ground against Cobra's crotch.

Feeling him react almost immediately she had to hold in her laughter. _'Too easy baby.'_ Her soul was laughing at him. She was such a bitch, he loved it.

Laxus and Gajeel's faces screwed up in disgust as they both leant their heads to the side to see if they were actually having sex in front of them. Realising that Lucy was joking Laxus smacked Gajeel away from him "You idiot, she's joking. They're just friends, right Luce? You're just friends?"

Looking back at Cobra's face she met his eye and winked "We're friends but possibly open to something more. Isn't everyone though? Just thought you two should be the first to know. Me and Erik are going to be getting to know each other a hell of a lot more in the next couple of weeks. Thanks for bringing him along on that mission, appreciate it bro."

 _'Erik?'_

 _'Cobra's Erik?'_

"We're going for a jog, stay safe guys. If those girls show up again ring my lacrima, gotta defend my turf." Jumping to her feet, she gave Laxus and Gajeel a salute.

"Until next time gentlemen" She hopped up the stairs but stopped half way to glare at cobra. _'Get your ass up here if you want to clean yourself in a functioning shower and not from a_ sink' her soul shouted at him, clearly angry that he didn't follow her like a well behaved dog.

Nodding at the two other dragon slayers who were watching him leave with mouths hanging open he followed Lucy up the stairs "I'm not a dog." he grumbled at her, her response was simply.

"Yes you are, and I'm the bitch. We make a good tag team. Maybe we should do wrestling or something."

Cobra smirked at the weird girl who had somehow managed to worm her way into his life and into his heart "You're so strange. Did you get dropped on your head as a baby?"

She put her finger on her chin as if thinking but them jumped on him, wrapping an arm around his neck, rubbing her knuckles hard on his scalp.

"Ow get off me you psycho, or I won't shower with you." This caused Lucy's hand to still. Cobra looked at her with his good eye and saw she was frowning "Well I want you to shower with me so I best stop hadn't I."

Sighing in relief he rubbed his sore head and looked at Lucy, he eyed her up cautiously. "Are you feeling okay?" They were now walking through some woodland, it was a lovely day and the sun was just starting to rise so nobody was around to see them or hear their conversation.

 _'When I start to care about someone I get edgy, please don't make me say this out loud. I just really like you Erik.'_

"Well duh of course I know you like me, all you talk about is having sex with me, how long has it actually been since you last, y'know?" He made a vulgar motion with his hands that caused Lucy to pull a unimpressed face.

Trying to hide the blush that appeared on her cheeks she walked ahead of Cobra so he couldn't see her face.

"I've never had sex with anyone. I've never even kissed anyone"

 _'who was conscious anyway.'_

"or done anything you'd consider remotely sexual or even romantic. Guess I'm just not that appealing or people just can't handle the awesomeness that is Lucy Heartfilia."

Cobra was stumped.

 _'A virgin? She is far too good for me. Will I go to hell for defiling such a sweet girl?'_

He didn't know what to think. All he knew was that she hid behind the facade of being a sarcastic tough woman. She was tough but not in the way that she showed people. That was just something that Gajeel and Laxus had taught her and it worked but now Cobra could see straight through it.

She was still that sweet innocent girl that he and his guild mates had put in that infinity clock.

 _'She keeps making me forget what I did to her. I don't deserve to even be in her presence, let alone take her virtue.'_

He didn't want to be that kind of guy anymore that was just an utter asshole, he wanted to care about people and let them care about him.

"Whatever you're over thinking about, stop it. What's done is done, nothing can ever change it, I wouldn't change anything that has happened to me because it has made me who I am. If certain things happened different I would have never joined Fairy Tail, I would have never have met all my wonderful friends who helped me turn into someone I'm proud to be. I wouldn't have met you."

She poked Cobra's chest playfully "You'll feel the way I do eventually, this guild will change you for the better. You'll be amazed at what letting certain people in will do for you. You may be a poison dragon slayer but don't let it eat away at your soul." She pressed their hand's with their guild mark's against each others and slipped her fingers in between his.

"You're a good guy Cobra, I can see that and soon everyone else will too."

"When did you get so wise?" A smile stretched his face, he couldn't remember the last time he had actually been happy, until now.

* * *

"Wait what? You want to shower _**together**_?" Cobra stuttered out as he watched Lucy strip off her gym clothes. His eyes followed the path of her shorts as she pulled them down her legs.

 _'Holy shit she's naked.'_

She stepped out of her clothes and turned around and he was blown away at how perfect her body was. She had no shame showing off her nude form to him, it was admirable. Lucy slowly sauntered over to him, letting his eye eat up the sight of her body.

"No fun today Erik, just cleaning. This is just us getting to know each other." She said quietly as she started to unbutton his shirt, she kissed his shoulder, just getting a feel of the situation.

Cobra itched to touch her, just to have a feel. His hands moved of their own accord, going to cup one of her perky breasts but were instantly slapped away.

 _'No touching.'_ Lucy was serious.

Growling in frustration he just had to stand there as the blonde seductress continued to take his clothes off at a leisurely pace. She was making it perfectly clear that she was in no rush and that she wanted to take her time appreciating every inch of his body. When she got him down to just his boxers he started to get nervous.

* * *

"Well I can see someone's happy to see me." Lucy traced his member through the material of his boxers, causing a slight hiss of air to leave his lips.

Clenching his teeth he held his breath as she pushed her fingers into his waistband and-

"Princess I sensed your distress what is the-" Loke assessed the situation before him and realized it wasn't panic he was sensing but more, excitement.

"Oh my no what the hell is going on here?" Loke exclaimed loudly, attempting to divert his eyes from him master's nude form. Loke had become very loyal since becoming exclusive to Aries, never looking at any other woman. If this were the old Loke he would be pressing his face into Lucy's chest right now.

"I cannot catch a break." Lucy whined out.


	10. Chapter 10

"Loke, I swear to Mavis you are such a nuisance, what did I say about respecting my privacy and not just barging through your gate whenever you feel like it, don't you remember what happened last time?"

Lucy shouted, not even attempting to hide her naked form as she gestured wildly at her spirit. Loke's cheeks reddened at the mention of the last time he had tried to come to his princess's 'rescue'.

"If I had known the last time I came through my gate that you were just experiencing extreme pleasure I would have never shouted that I will give you my assistance. Please let that memory stay in the past. It's bad enough Aquarius holds it over my head."

Cobra shot to his feet and shoved the zodiac leader roughly out of the room. "Get the hell out of here you fucking creep. I'm the only one allowed to see her like this, now fuck off back to your own realm." Slamming the door in the shocked man's face, Cobra exhaled heavily, his head rested on the door frame as he attempted to calm his rage.

 _'Thank you Erik, let's continue please.'_

Turning his head slightly he eyed up the blonde beauty who was patiently waiting for his stupid ass to follow her into her shower, her long hair was trailing down her back, tickling the dimples that were at the bottom of her waist. She truly was a goddess.

 _'A goddess of war maybe.'_

Cobra thought as she entered the shower and turned to face him. She may not be flawless but that was what he liked about her. Lucy's body told a story, each scar had a tale to tell. It showed people that she was living her life to the fullest, damn the consequences. Truly, one of a kind.

Raising her eyebrow at the stunned looking dragon slayer, Lucy smiled crookedly at him "Are you coming in or not? I need you to wash my back big boy."

 _'Yes please.'_

Cobra groaned internally as he shed the last piece of clothing and hopped into the shower but instantly cringed and pressed his body against the glass of the cubicle. "What the hell woman that is scolding hot, are you trying to melt my skin?"

A loud laugh escaped Lucy's lips are she lathered some shampoo into her hair "You may be used to having cold showers all the time but I need them hot. If you don't want to be here by all means, go." She held eye contact with him, almost challenging him to run away like she knew he wanted to.

 _'What is it with me and running away?'_

Cobra was just so used to running that it had become second nature without him even realizing and that was going to cause big problems because now, for the first time in his life, he didn't want to or need to run away. He was safe but his body and mind were constantly trying to keep him in old habits that needed to be broken. That **would** be broken.

Letting his eye crawl up her body, a lazy smile appeared on his face when he saw her nipples turn into little hardened peaks when his eye settled on them, Lucy's arousal was all around him.

It was maddening. If she didn't want to do anything with him then he would, of course, respect her wishes. Wanting to take it slow wasn't a problem, at all, just the fact of having her naked form so close he could almost taste it was the problem.

He wanted to know everything about this girl, from her favorite color to what she was afraid of most in this world so he could protect her, forever. This wasn't something where he wanted to fuck and chuck. Cobra genuinely liked this girl, it was kind of scary.

Having never felt these kinds of emotions before, he had to question if what he were feeling was actually real or if he was just latching onto someone who had shown him kindness for the first time in his life but considering Brain had been kind to him once upon a time and he didn't feel like he wanted to fuck him, Cobra could only assume this was the real deal.

There was also the matter of her two adoptive dragon slayer brothers, if they sensed that he had just climbed right aboard Lucy like a train they would kick his ass and before he knew it he would be the pariah of Fairy Tail again.

"What are you thinking about Erik? I don't feel like it's what you should be considering your lack of approval of my body." Lucy nodded down at his manhood that was facing south, not amused at their current situation. He could sense that she was insulted.

 _'Stupid Erik, I look fucking hot and his dick is totally making me feel like a fool, I'll make it wake up.'_

Dropping down to her knees, Lucy grabbed his flaccid member and attempted to place it in her mouth but much to her shock Cobra yanked himself away.

"What the hell Lucy don't do that! What happened to 'nothing happens today?' We aren't doing anything until you're ready to. Trying to give me a blowjob because you're insulted I'm not erect looking at your body is not the right way to go."

Cobra looked at the floor and suppressed a shudder "Besides I was thinking about Laxus and Gajeel so it would have been weird if I was hard."

Lucy gasped and smacked his thigh causing a wet slap to echo in the bathroom, she got back up to her feet and pressed her nose against his "Why the hell are you thinking about those two at a time like this? I'm stood before you, naked and wet and you're not even fussed. Are you even attracted to women? Oh Mavis, I've fallen for you and you actually bat for the other team. This is a tragedy."

Cobra attempted to stutter out an excuse but Lucy held her hand up silencing him "That's okay bud, if you're really not interested that's fine but-"

Growling loudly, Cobra stepped forward and pressed the blonde girl's body against the glass, his member now standing to attention, pressing against her stomach.

"I was thinking about them because I don't want them to think I don't treat you with the respect you deserve." He pressed a kiss against her neck. "I don't want to rush this and ruin it." then a kiss against her cheek. "This all needs to be perfect. Just like you."

 _'Kiss me properly you utter moron.'_ Lucy's soul moaned at Cobra.

"You know just what to say to charm a guy Heartfilia." He mumbled as he wrapped his arms around her soft body and placed a gentle kiss on her lips.

 _'Tastes just like I imagined, sweet and addictive.'_ He thought as he started to ravage her lips, hungry for more. Lucy moaned softly into his mouth as he took what was his.

He nipped gently on her plump lower lip asking for her to let him in, she happily obliged, feeling his tongue roughly enter her mouth made her squirm with excitement.

 _'If I could stay like this, with this beautiful little spitfire wrapped around me forever, I could die a happy man'_

* * *

 _'She's late. Why is she always late. Like I want to stay here any longer than I have to, I look like such a loser sitting here alone.'_

Cobra tapped his finger on the bar top as he waited for Lucy to come back from her mission with Laxus. It was an easy enough job that only required the two of them. He would've gone with them but Lucy insisted that they would be fine and she needed to have a catch up with her brother anyway.

After that day in the shower they had barely left each other's side. They hadn't done anymore than kissing but it was more than enough for him.

He didn't need to go all the way with Lucy to imagine what it felt like. He was having to relieve himself several times a day at this rate because of that sexy little fairy. It was all worth it, she was worth it.

"You seem a little lonely, mind if I pull up a stool?" A woman said as she approached him from behind, after the incident with the two girls at the gym, no females had dared even look at him, scared of how Lucy would react. Even when she wasn't with him, they thought she was watching from afar.

"Look I'm waiting for someone so-"

"Yes, you're waiting for Lucy. She's like a sister to me so I was hoping we could have a little talk. Man to man." The woman in question turned out to be Erza Scarlet, queen of the faires herself.

Cobra felt himself shrink a little at her menacing stare. Nodding towards the seat next to him she released him from her death glare and smiled. "Thank you. Now I hope you understand that I'm not trying to nose into yours and Lucy's business. I would never dream of doing that. I've just seen her hurt too many times. Physically and emotionally."

A haunted look crossed her face. "We've all seen it happen to her, haven't we Cobra?"

A wave of shame flooded his body. She was referring to the times he and his guild had attacked Fairy Tail and trapped Lucy in the infinity clock. Even then when she was being absorbed into it something deep inside his body roared at him to save her but being the idiot he was, he ignored it. Never again.

"But I'm not here to remind you of your mistakes. I'm here to give you my blessing." This caught Cobra's attention "Your blessing? You approve of us?" He said, almost in shock at the redhead before him.

He didn't expect anyone to approve of him and Lucy, they tried to keep it a secret but found they couldn't keep their hands off each other so it was just easier to say that they were seeing one and other.

Erza smirked. "I wouldn't say I approve but I'm willing to give you a chance with her. I haven't seen Lucy glow this much in a long time. Sure on the outside she was happy but on the inside she was hurting. You seem to have healed that hurt and turned her wounds into scars. I know of all the awful things that happened in the tower of heaven" Both of their hands instinctively went to their wrists.

"But you don't have to let what happened to you then define who you are now. I can see deep down you are a good man, so prove me right, Erik."

Then she left as quickly as she had arrived.

"How does Erza know your real name?" A voice said behind him as a pair of arms wrapped around his torso. Lucy placed a sloppy kiss on his cheek causing a girlish squeak to leave Cobra's mouth. He cleared his throat and scowled, trying to hide his pathetic reaction to a bit of saliva. "I don't know, did you tell her?"

Lucy wiped his cheek of the residue left from her kiss and shook her head, trying to suppress a giggle "Nope, I didn't say anything. She's super in the know with everything though, I wouldn't be surprised if she knew the length of your dick."

His head spun around to look at the requip mage who lifted her drink up at him, smiling slyly.

 _'What the fuck.'_

"I though the rest of the Oracion Seis were still in jail, they broke out? That's not good" Cobra's sensitive ears picked up on a mage's conversation. His guild mates had bust out of prison?

"I've got to go to mayor's office to pick up the reward money with Laxus, want to meet me at my place? The key's under the plant pot outside, you can start making dinner honey bum." She winked her big brown eye at him and skipped out of the guild, her tiny skirt fluttering up, showing off the curve of her ass cheeks.

"Damn, wouldn't mind a piece of that." One of the older mages said, whistling his approval as Lucy walked out past them. Cobra spat a cluster of diluted poison at the man, causing him to fall off his chair. He tutted as he walked past the dirty bastard who was coughing loudly on the floor.

"Back off old man, that piece of ass is taken."

Hearing laughs of amusement and gasps of shock at his actions he left the guild to go to his home away from home. It was quite unreal how fast he had settled in at Lucy's house. It was better than his apartment in every way, plus Lucy was there so that trumped going back to his place every time.

It was nice to just have someone to sleep next to at night. Whenever he would wake up from nightmares instead of just being drenched in sweat and fear he was being held by Lucy as she brushed his hair with her fingers and said soothing words.

She was everything he needed and also everything he didn't deserve.

"I see you've got a new celestial mage in your life? Don't need little old angel anymore?"

Cobra rolled his eye at who stood before him, not surprised at all. "Hello Sorano."


	11. Chapter 11

**_A/N Just a quick one, when you first meet Kinana in this story, she has not joined Fairy Tail yet._**

"Thank you very much sir, you have my deepest gratitude. Goodness knows what could have happened if you hadn't stepped in and saved the day. Possible death. You truly are amazing."

Lucy scowled at the man standing before her and Laxus, he was the person who had issued the request to Fairy Tail to get rid of a minute pest problem, it was specifically suited for Laxus's magical abilities as the form said that the rats were immune to every type of magical damage except electric/lightning.

They could not be killed any other way. She very much doubted that it was simply a coincidence, he probably planned this for months. When Lucy and Laxus had gone under his estate into the sewer system to see the magical rats, she immediately smelled bullshit. They were regular rats, nothing special.

He was practically getting a boner at being so close to Laxus. The stupid chubby little man hadn't once acknowledged Lucy's existence, she might as well not be there.

She wanted to kiss Laxus just to piss him off. _'Hey.'_ Lucy thought to herself, a huge smirk appearing on her face as she glanced up at the bored looking dragon slayer _'That would be hilarious.'_

"Hey Laxus?" Lucy said in a small voice to get his attention, he looked down at Lucy to make sure she were okay and his eyes widened in shock when she jumped up, wrapped her arms around his neck and planted a wet kiss on his lips.

A loud wheezing sound came from the man in front of the lip locked pair, feeling like she had made her point she detached herself from a mortified Laxus and slapped his muscular butt. "See you later big boy."

She switched her eyes to the very faint looking gentleman before her, she placed a sickly sweet smile on her face and tilted her head forward, bowing it for him.

"Thank you for issuing this mission Sir, make sure to pay my hubby well, he worked so hard to get rid of those giant super rats."

Strutting out of the office she tried to hold in the laugh that was trying to tumble out of her mouth. Someone people were just too easy to piss off. She would have to explain to Laxus the next time she saw him that she didn't kiss him to try and woo him, not at all. _'Now, time to go play with my Cobra.'_

She took a right turn out of the building, heading towards her house. She'd cook herself and Erik some food and maybe things might get a bit fun later on. Whatever happens, happens. Lucy knew that people always thought that their first time should be special, a truly magical moment, she didn't understand for the life of her why.

If you want to have sex with someone, do it. The only reason she had never done it was she simply wasn't attracted to anyone enough. Lucy never imagined that this special connection she had with Erik would materialize considering the circumstances on how they met.

"We're regrouping at Hargeon, have a think about coming back. Now that Brain isn't with us, we could use having you join up. You two always did butt heads didn't you"

Lucy stopped dead in her tracks, that voice. It was very similar to someone who she hoped she'd never have the pleasure of meeting again. Angel. But who was she talking to?

Pulling up her skirt Lucy reached for her keys that were strapped around her upper thigh, she found that having them hidden from enemy eyes meant they were safer and it was much more secure than being loosely held around her waist.

She grasped one of her keys and silently summoned Gemini. They popped out of their gate, cheering at their summon but soon quietened down when Lucy started flapping her arms around like a maniac, trying to quieten them.

"Sorry Master, we just got so excited, it's been a very long time since we have been brought out. How can we help?"

The twins said in unison, the little blue spirits floated around excitedly. Lucy knelt down onto her knees and crawled along the edge of the building. Pointing around the side of the wall Lucy motioned for the spirits to follow.

"Hey guys, sorry for not summoning you for a while, it's just you always come out as me in a towel and I wanted to save myself the embarrassment and keep my dignity for a while longer."

At the mention of that the two transformed into Lucy clad only in a towel and stretched, letting any passerbyers see her exposed ass cheeks.

Squeaking in shock she pulled the towel over the fake hers ass cheeks but only succeeded in pulling the towel completely off, exposing the double of hers nude body for the whole world to see.

Gemini Lucy covered their body with their arms "It's a bit chilly."

Lucy practically had steam coming from her ears, she was that angry, hearing footsteps approaching her and her body double she jumped to her feet and pressed her clothed body against her spirit's naked copy of hers.

Circling her arms around their waist she covered their butt and pressed the spirit against the wall, feeling her breasts squashed against, well her breasts, was very weird.

"That is it, this is why you don't get summoned, look at what's happened, now transform into a random person you've seen and walk around the corner and-"

"Lucy." Someone said hesitantly, almost sounding unsure.

The blonde leant her head back to see who had said her name, she saw slicked back hair and piercings. "Oh, hey Gajeel, you're looking very suave today. Big date with Levy huh? Well don't let me keep you. Good seeing you bro."

She arched her head back to face Gemini who had a very childlike grin on their face. They started to try to wriggle out of her hold, Lucy tried her best to press against them harder but they popped out of her grasp and ran down the street, naked as the day she was born, showing everyone her birthday suit.

She could see her own butt cheeks shaking as they ran down the path, towards the center of town.

Gajeel stared at the retreating form running away from them in incredulity. Lucy swiftly swung their key through the air and watched as they disappeared in a shimmer of light as she forcibly closed their gate.

Whoever was around that corner was long gone thanks to their shenanigans. Gemini could stay in the celestial realm with Loke for a while. They were both grounded as far as she was concerned. If they didn't act like children she wouldn't have to treat them like such.

"What the hell, why did I just see your ugly ass running away like a madman? Being your friend is so weird bunny."

Lucy pressed her head against the side of the building she was previously pressing herself and Gemini against and sighed "I know Gaj." She mumbled.

* * *

"It's great to see that your girlfriend is putting my spirit to good use." Angel said sarcastically as she looked back at Lucy, who was practically wrestling with someone who looked almost identical to her. "Your spirit?"

Cobra said looking at Angel as he pulled her away from his girlfriend. This woman was a piece of work. Smelling that Gajeel was nearby he made the decision to leave Lucy to him and to take Angel far away from them.

The silver haired mage rolled her eyes "That's my, well was my celestial spirit, Gemini, also known as the twins. They can replicate whoever they have touched. For some reason, little blondie back there has told them to copy her, clad in a towel. How strange. Do you like your woman to act like they don't have a shred of dignity? I mean even normally she's dressed like she should be stood on a street corner in the middle of the night working by the hour, honestly-"

A purple clawed hand wrapped around Angel's neck and lifted her off the ground, Cobra started at his old guild member with venom in his eyes "Don't talk about her, just don't talk at all." He pressed harder on her windpipe to make his point clear.

"Just fuck off, I'm not interested in the Oracion Seis or what you have planned. Leave me well out of it."

Smiling sadistically at the poison dragon slayer, Angel placed her hand over Cobra's clawed one and pressed against it, causing more pressure on her tender neck then managed to choke out three words "We have Cubellios."

 _'Cubellios?'_

He retracted his hand and let the girl fall to the ground in a messy heap. She coughed loudly, desperately trying to suck in oxygen at the same time. Cobra growled in frustration "Where is she? Why do you have her? Answer me you stupid bitch." He kicked her side to try and force her to talk but only succeeded in causing a groan of pain to leave her. It made him smile.

"Now Cobra that's enough, we don't fight amongst each other, that's what sets us apart from other dark guilds. Now be a good boy and come along with us."

Midnight came out from an alleyway behind them. Looking around he saw Racer next to him as well. _'I'm outnumbered.'_ He thought as he watched Angel slowly get to her feet.

Her neck now had a thick purple bruise around it with small burns on the edge of it from his poison that secreted out of his dragon scaled hands, she walked over to Midnight's side and smiled.

"Just come with us Cobra, don't you want to see your precious snake again?"

Letting out a groan of frustration he moved towards them, glaring at Midnight with disgust evident on his face "Just take me to her, I'm leaving after that, you understand? I don't want to be a part of your sick little games anymore Midnight. You're just like your father, fucked the hell up."

Midnight's eyes met Cobra's good eye and twinkled with mischief, that only meant that he was already in one of his games and by the looks of it, Cobra had just lost. "Yes, I suppose I am just like him."

They had a safe house located in Hargeon that Midnight had somehow arranged whilst he was still in prison. How they had found Cubellios was beyond him, he had lost hope that he would ever find his beloved snake ever again. He hadn't looked as hard as he probably could have, Cobra would admit that.

He had been preoccupied with Lucy and being in a regular guild was so great that he had forgotten about Cub. She was taken away from him when he had been taken to prison. To see her again would make his life complete.

Cobra thought about the meeting of her and Lucy and smiled internally. She would love Cubellios, he just knew it. He just hoped Cub would like Lucy, she was never quick to warm up to strangers, always shoot venom at this or shoot venom at that.

She would get a smacked tail if she tried to shoot venom at his Lucy.

The carriage they were awkwardly sat in came to a halt and a knock on the door indicated they had arrived at their destination. Practically leaping through the door of the wagon he stood outside the house.

He hoped this wasn't just a trick to get him to follow them, he would look very stupid if it was. They all knew how much he loved that snake, he'd do anything for her.

"She's just inside Cobra, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised." Angel said as she opened the door for him to enter. The room was pitch black, turning on the light switch he let out a bitter laugh at what was there "That's not Cubellios, who the hell is that?" He said as he pointed at the purple haired girl who was tied up on the floor, covered head to toe in scratches and muck.

"That is Cubellios in her natural form. She goes by Kinana now though. Thought you'd be happy to be reunited Cobra, don't be mean to the poor girl. She's been saying your name for days now, waiting for you to come save her."

Midnight walked in front of him as he continued speaking "Isn't she a beauty? She looks absolutely ravishing." He grabbed a handful of her short hair and yanked her head up so Cobra could fully see her face.

The girl started to regain consciousness, her eyes opened and focused on Cobra, a beaming smile appeared on her bruised face "Erik you came, I knew you would save me."

 _'No fucking way.'_

* * *

"It's been two frickin' days where the hell is he. He doesn't answer his lacrima, he never shows up for dinner, would he have left me? No, we were doing so good. I'm such an idiot."

Lucy was shouting and squawking as she cycled viciously on an exercise bike in the gym, Laxus and Gajeel were standing on the other side of the gym, staying out of the way of the raging blonde, afraid of getting her anger taken out on them.

"So Lax, Lucy kissed you huh." Gajeel said, trying to break the awkward silence that had settled over them as they watched the celestial mage have an intense argument with herself.

The lightening mage's face turned a deep shade of crimson at the mention of his adoptive sister kissing him.

"Well I-"

"It was all for show, get over yourself big guy." Lucy interjected "That man who was there so had the hots for you and was totally ignoring me. Unacceptable I say, so I kissed you to make him jealous. End of."

Gajeel burst out laughing, holding his head at her reasoning "I thought you were with Cobra though? Bunny don't cheat on the poor guy."

"Ahem" someone said, clearing their throat to get the three mages attention "Sorry to interrupt."

Lucy glared at the person daring to enter the gym, she thought she had made it perfectly clear that she had it booked for the morning but what she saw made her legs come to a halt on the bike and her mouth to fall open.

Cobra was standing in the entrance, his eye narrowed at Laxus, he obviously heard that she had kissed him.

 _'So not like that Erik.'_

Lucy thought so he could hopefully hear her and not be mad.

"Where the hell have you been Erik? Do you know how worried I've been? I swear to Mavis you-"

"Erik, what's going on?" A small feminine voice came from behind the poison slayer. To be precise, a woman's voice. Following the sound, Lucy noticed that there was a small hand clasping Cobra's, their fingers entwined.

 _'Oh hell no, you are fucking kidding me, he finds a new girl and brings her here to meet me? Are you serious.'_

Lucy knew there was probably a logical explanation for all of this but she didn't want to listen to her head right now, her heart was hurting.

"Guys, this is Kinana." He pulled the woman out from behind him and introduced her to Gajeel, Laxus and Lucy. The two men coughed awkwardly, anxiously awaiting a Lucy breakdown but she wasn't going to give them what they expected wanted.

Feeling tears well up in her eyes she calmly hopped off the bike and shuffled out of the gym as fast as she could on her wobbly legs. Shouldering past him she mumbled into his ear when she left.

"See you later Cobra."


	12. Chapter 12

It had been three days. Three days since Lucy had last spoken to Cobra, or even acknowledged his existence. Every time they had crossed each other's path, Lucy would high tail it in the opposite direction and he would always run after her, every single time.

But that purple haired girl was never far behind him. Lucy had even been avoiding her gym sessions just on the off chance that he'd be waiting there for her. She really didn't want to see him. A lot of the reason why was just pure stubbornness, she hated to admit it but it was true.

Missing him had caused a slight ache in her heart that was just getting worse. She would eventually talk to him but only when she felt she was ready to. People couldn't have a go at her for that, could they?

Whenever she saw his maroon hair, she ducked into a corner or behind someone else. She even stopped using her usual body wash so her scent was different. Laxus said that the one I was using now was grotesque, it was perfect for putting off a slayers nose.

Currently, she was sat in the far corner of the guild hall with Laxus's hooded jacket pulled over her head, at the table with her was Gajeel, Laxus and Levy. Huffing loudly in frustration, the celestial mage lifted her hands above her head in a prayer motion.

"Please can we go out tonight guys? I need to let off some steam and dance my sexy little ass off."

Levy whooped loudly, getting the attention of the majority of the guild, Lucy dropped to the floor and hissed at her best friend "Levy be quiet would you, you don't know where that little snake in the grass is lurking." By that she obviously meant Cobra. The bluenette rolled her eyes "Give the poor guy a break Lulu, I heard that girl isn't even his-"

"Lalala I don't want to talk about this." Lucy covered her ears with her hands to block out Levy's words. Whoever that girl Cobra brought back was, Lucy wasn't interested in it. They can live happily ever after but if anybody rubs it in her face she'd rub their face in the ground.

Plue was extremely unhappy with her at the moment as well because of the lack of Cobra in her life. Whenever he was summoned he'd look around and would gesture wildly as to where the man was and when Lucy said he wasn't going to be around anymore he'd sulk. She couldn't win.

If Cobra didn't want her he would have to tell her, but in her twisted mind if he couldn't talk to her, he couldn't say whatever they had was over.

"If bunny wants to go out and get absolutely trashed, we should support her decision and help her, also we should get trashed with her as to help with moral support." He winked at Laxus who laughed in response to Gajeel's not so sly way of saying they were going to get absolutely hammered tonight, in honor of Lucy.

Excitedly jumping to her feet causing her hood to fall down, Lucy stated the plan. "Right then it's decided. Party tonight, we're not just staying at the guild though, we're going all out in Magnolia. Levy." Lucy held her hand out to the bluenette.

"Take my hand, if you dare, because we're going to get ready for the best night ever." Levy meekly took her hand and was pulled out of the guild "Make sure to look hot guys." She shouted over her shoulder, not fully hearing Levy's warning of someone being in front of her.

Lucy collided with a solid chest, warm arms encircled her to stop her from falling and eating the floor. "You okay princess?"

"Yes I'm fine, thank you Cobra." She said bluntly, she knew who it was without even looking, his smell was intoxicating and his body was just so familiar. She missed it.

Pressing her face into his shoulder, she nuzzled his neck and was about to kiss it but managed to pull herself back. She had done that without even realizing, it scared her what this man did to her body. The attraction was so strong.

Cobra looked extremely happy at the interaction "I knew you couldn't stay mad at me forever, are you going to let me explain now?"

Lifting her eyes up to meet his, they looked so hopeful but she saw his new girl in her peripheral vision. Then the words that came out of her mouth made her hate herself just that little bit more. "Fuck off."

His eye narrowed at her, now cold and stone like. Any twinkle that was in them had now been completely extinguished. Walking past him was hard, hearing his new piece of ass asking if he was okay was harder. Not going back there and kicking her ass for touching him was the hardest.

"You're being nasty Lu." Levy stated, frowning slightly at her friend, causing Lucy to let out a long sigh "Yeah I know I am."

* * *

Lucy was stood in the middle of her room in a matching set of pink lacy underwear and curled hair, surrounded by potential outfits. Levy was already dressed and ready to go. Lucy was clearly not. All that was left for her to do was pick out her outfit but it proving to be the hardest part.

"Levy help me. What do I wear? I want a look that says 'Yeah I'm hot but I don't want you to approach me' Any of them screaming that at you?"

A thoughtful look crossed Levy's face as she examined all of the dresses before them and smiled deviously when she pointed at one in particular "That one with those killer pink heels, you'll look sexy and scary."

Lucy picked up the article of clothing in question and smirked "Yeah, you got the nail on the head with this little number."

Slipping the black skin tight material down over her body, she made sure it tucked into all the right curves and made her body look amazing.

Then she finished off the look with some pink shoes and they were ready to go. Marching out of the apartment, the two girls giggled at the sight of Laxus and Gajeel, Lucy's landlady was clearly trying to chat them up while they were waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs.

"That explains why Gajeel was messaging us so much telling us to hurry up." Levy whispered into Lucy's ear "Poor guys, she's practically humping Laxus. Save your brother."

Lucy rushed down the last few steps and leaped into Laxus's arms, giving him a big bear hug and successfully removing her creepy landlady from his vicinity "Thank you ma'am for looking after our boys, we're leaving now, see you later."

Struggling to all fit through the doorway at once, Levy and Lucy let the boys go first as they were clearly emotionally and mentally scarred after that encounter.

Safe to say they probably won't be coming to her apartment anytime soon. "She's crazy you know?" Gajeel said, grasping Levy's hand for dear life. "Yeah, Crazy horny." Lucy said laughing like a maniac.

"Shut up, that was terrifying. We're meeting at a safe place next time, somewhere far away from her wandering hands. She tried to put them down the back of my trousers." Laxus shuddered at the memory "She's like 60, so very wrong."

Seeing the club show up in the distance, Lucy grabbed some jewel out of her bra and waved it in the air. "First round's on me, shots, shots and some more shots."

"Sounds about right bunny. Just behave tonight you hear? You run around like a lunatic when you've had a drink, it's almost impossible for me and Laxus to keep track of you and keep our promise to always protect you."

Lucy waved off his concern like it was nothing "I'm always well behaved, don't know what nonsense you're spewing."

With laxus volunteering to go to the bar and get the drinks, Gajeel's bulky frame made a path for the two girls to get to a table and wait for their alcohol to come to them. Looking around the club, Lucy didn't see too many guys, it was a complete vagina fest.

Scanning the tables surrounding her, her smoky brown eyes landed on a head of red hair and stunningly green eyes. _'Hello beautiful.'_ She thought as the mystery man gaze fell on her and he eyed her up appreciatively but she immediately felt ashamed for even thinking about another man when she was still so hung up on Cobra and averted her eyes.

 _'Stupid hormones thinking I'd just fuck anyone with a pretty face.'_

A tray full of glasses filled with various different types of liquids landed directly in front of Lucy, she clapped her hands like a happy seal at the offering of alcohol presented before her. "Let's get started then shall we." Laxus said as they all grabbed a shot glass and raised them to the sky.

* * *

"Lucy, you look lovely tonight." Laxus slurred out as they stood on the edge of the dance floor "I'm happy to call you my sister, beautiful and funny and strong." He poked her ribs playfully "Even if you have been avoiding the gym." A sad look crossed his face "Cobra came every morning at 5AM to see if you were there. He really loves you Luce. That girl, Kinana is-"

"I'm going to go dance Laxus, there's a girl coming over who wants to chat you up, good luck." Lucy winked at him and slipped into the crowd successfully ending their conversation and laughing as he saw an uncomfortable look cover the lightening slayer's face at having a random girl flirt with him. He had always hated it, he was not a social person.

After having plenty of drinks, a comfortable numb feeling had settled over her body. Her brain was foggy but not dangerously so and she felt drunk enough that dancing amongst a sea of strangers didn't seem embarrassing.

A different song came onto the sound system and Lucy raised her hands into the air along with everyone else, when someone settled in behind her, placing their hands onto her waist and rocking to the song with her.

It felt nice, she didn't see why she should stop them. Peeking over her shoulder she was surprised to see it was the male redhead she had eyed up earlier on. His face was flushed from the alcohol he had consumed and he smiled drunkenly at her "Mind if I have this dance?"

She shook her head and smiled "Not at all." Turning back around they rocked back and forth, dancing slowly to the song. It wasn't really one made for this kind of dancing but it felt right.

After several minutes she had felt something hard digging into her back, clearly someone was a little bit too excited. His lips touched her ear and made her flinch "Want to come outside to get some fresh air and talk?"

Looking around, she couldn't see any of her friends nearby to scold her for leaving with a random guy so she held her hand out for him to take "Lead the way."

Pushing through the hoards of people was relatively difficult but it was worth it when they finally reached outside, the fresh air was wonderful considering how stuffy and warm it was inside. "So I didn't catch your name, I'm Lu-"

 _'Well I don't know why I didn't see this coming.'_

Lucy thought as the guy practically sucked her lips off in an over enthusiastic kiss.

* * *

"I know she seems like a little bitch but she's not normally like this, if she actually let me talk to her I could sort it out." Cobra ran his hand through his already messy hair while Kinana was standing in the kitchen of his dingy apartment trying to cook up something for dinner but was failing miserably because of the lack of ingredients.

As he was usually around Lucy's house he didn't stock up his apartment with anything apart from the essentials like toilet roll and bleach.

She gently pulled off the apron she was wearing and placed it on the work surface.

"Erik, I don't think she's a bad person, I'm not judging her for the way she's been acting. I'd just love to get to know someone who actually managed to worm their way into your heart. I find it fascinating. Now we need to go out and get some actual food, I can't make something out of flour and some lemons."

Taking his hand in hers, Kinana tried to calm her friend down. "Erik, stop stressing. We'll eat and then we'll figure something out. She can't stay mad at you for much longer, you saw how she acted earlier. She misses you too. I'm sorry that I caused this to happen."

Cobra grasped her face in his hands and shook his head.

"This wasn't your fault so don't say that. I just miss her so much. It's like part of me is missing, I don't like being in love if it can make you feel like this."

"Love is always worth it Erik, never give up because once it's gone, you can never get it back."

"You're so damn good with your words, I wish you could've spoken to me sooner." Cobra said, laughing slightly at the expression on Kinana's face as she huffed at him. "I was trying to be serious you idiot, let's just go."

* * *

Moaning loudly at the burgers they had gotten from some greasy takeaway place, their grumbling belly's finally shut up. "We need to go there more often, this is amazing." Kinana mumbled out through a mouthful of food as she shoved the last bit of meat into her mouth.

"Yeah I agree, wow that is tasty, I could eat-"

"Get the hell off me you creep." A girl exclaimed loudly, interrupting Cobra's food talk. His half eaten burger fell to the ground as he ran after the voice. _'That's Lucy, who the hell would dare touch her? They're going to lose a finger.'_

The sounds of drunken people assaulted his sensitive ears as he approached a club that he heard Lucy and her friends were going to tonight. Walking down the side path to the club, he stopped dead in his tracks.

The pair stunk of alcohol but the male was what was causing Cobra's blood to boil. He was forcibly trying to shove his tongue down Lucy's throat as she punched his back. His body had pinned her against the door to the club and stopped any means of escape.

 _'This is why I should bring my keys on nights out because of creeps like you._ _'_

Her soul was in serious distress.

Taking a step forward, her panicked eyes shot to his approaching body and when she saw it was Cobra her internal dialect almost made him fall over with laughter.

 _'Oh great, my knight in shining tinfoil has arrived. I don't need your help reptile, watch.'_

Lucy closed her jaw and from the looks of it, almost bit the guys tongue off. Blood fell down her chin as the guy pulled back and roared in pain "You stupid slut, you bit me." He spoke with a slight lisp from the damage done to his tongue but neither Lucy nor Cobra were expecting the guy to sucker punch her in the face and knock her down to the floor.

"You little fucker." Cobra growled as he approached the drunk man, his eyes were focused on Lucy's unmoving body, huddled on the cold floor "You're going to regret even looking at her. I can't guarantee you'll be able to walk once I'm through with you."

"Holy shit" The redhead said, eyes widening as he realized who Cobra was. He backed away from the poison dragon slayer until he was pressed against the side of the building "You're Cobra, from the Oracion Seis, the dark guild."

"No, I'm Erik from Fairy Tail and you just fucked up buddy."


	13. Chapter 13

"You really are pathetic" Cobra muttered as he pressed his foot down on the man's chest, feeling satisfied when he heard a loud crunch signalling one or hopefully several of his ribs were now broken. The drunk guy roared in pain, clawing at Cobra's leg which only spurred the dragon slayer on to inflict more damage to his body.

 _'Oh god, he's going to kill me. I don't want to die.'_ The pathetic ramblings of the man's soul were getting on Cobra's last nerve. Glancing across the alley way at Lucy's unconscious body made him hit harder and try to get rid of this idiot so he could get her stupid ass home, she was going to get hypothermia dressed the way she was in this weather.

"Kinana hurry up and get down here, Lucy's hurt." Cobra shouted for his friend who he could hear was running towards the side street, her purple hair flashed in his peripheral vision, she flew straight to his side, gasping softly when she saw Lucy lying on the floor.

She knelt down on the floor beside the blonde's unconscious form and checked her over for any injuries. Cobra knew that apart from that nasty fucking bruise on her face the only thing that was hurt was her pride. It was obvious by the way she acted that having to be rescued by him right now was the last thing she wanted.

"If acting like a decent human being wasn't so difficult for you, I wouldn't of needed to do this." As the man tried to sit up, Cobra kicked him in the jaw, succeeding in keeping him down on the ground, where he belonged.

"You had to hurt someone I happen to care about very much." Kneeling down on the floor, Cobra held him by the collar of his shirt so he could stare directly into his eyes.

"You truly are a waste of space and I'd be doing the world a favor by wiping you out of existence, but I'm on bail and you so aren't worth going back to prison for."

"Oh no." Kinana said as a loud scuffling sounded "Please don't get up Lu-"

"You may not be able to." A scratchy voice said at the side of Cobra's head "But I sure as shit can." Lucy stomped her heeled foot down, right on the guy's crotch, the man howled in pain so loudly that Cobra had to cover his ears from the ungodly screech.

Tears were streaming down the guy's face from the pain and then he lost consciousness. Cobra looked up at Lucy, his mouth hung open at the brutality he just witnessed, it was incredible. His own testicles ached from what he just witnessed.

Lucy sighed as she held her hand against her aching face, a small smirk on her lips. "Well, I can at least make sure he can't bring anybody else into existence. That should've killed his balls, maybe one more for good measure"

She went to kick him again but Cobra jumped to his feet and pulled her into a bear hug, securing her tightly in his arms.

"You idiot, I could've lost you. He was thinking some shitty things when I got here. You could've-" His voice cracked slightly as he pressed his nose into her blonde hair, he could just catch the faintest whiff of strawberries.

"I'm fine." She swallowed loudly "Erik. I'm okay. Thank you." Slowly pulling away from his warm embrace, she turned around and held her hand out for Kinana to shake "I probably should have done this a long time ago. Hello, my name is Lucy. It's very nice to meet you Kinana."

 _'Why the hell am I trying to shake her hand, am I a 60 year old man? Hug her,_ oh _Mavis help me.'_ A mixture of emotions crossed Lucy's face before she decided fuck it and grasped the purple haired woman in a swift hug.

Kinana stared at Cobra in shock over Lucy's shoulder at the sudden change in the blondes behavior "I'm really sorry for how I've been acting. If you and Cobra are together I'll just have to suck it up and act like an adult about it all. You seem like a really lovely person, I know we haven't actually spoken but I can tell by how you're-"

"We're not a couple Lucy, we're old friends." Kinana glanced at Cobra and smiled brightly "Best friends. He talks quite fondly of you, I'd love to get to know you a bit more." Lucy's face went slack at her words and started to stutter.

"Y-you're not a couple? Are you sure?" Her eyes shot to Cobra who frowned at his silly girlfriend, he tutted loudly.

"Pretty sure. Now you can't say I didn't try to tell you. You really are stubborn sometimes. We'll talk about this once I get you home. Who are you here with Luce?"

"Laxus, Gajeel and Levy but this wasn't their fault. Laxus got pounced on by a girl, he's so hopeless with them and Levy and Gaj are probably still in the corner eating each others faces off."

Her face scrunched up at the thought of it. "I came out here, it's my fault."

"I know it's your fault." Cobra said matter of factly causing Lucy to scream internally "Kina, can you go inside and tell them what's happened and that I'm taking her home. I'd rather they didn't see her right now."

She nodded her head "Yeah that's fine, I'll give you a call later on your lacrima when I get home, it was great to finally talk to you Lucy, hopefully the next time we meet will be under better circumstances."

"Stay safe, ring me if you need me." Cobra said as she walked off into the club.

Looking at her ruffled appearance and bruised face he frowned. "You look like shit babe, we need to get you a bath like right now."

Lucy threw her hands up in the air, giving up with this whole situation "Thanks Erik, you're just a bundle of compliments today aren't you? Really, you know how to make a girl feel good about herself."

He smirked as he grasped her hand and started walking out of the alley way "Yeah that's why you love me though. I don't bullshit you. Now after tonight you have got some serious ass kissing to make up with how much of a bitch you've been, seriously."

"Yeah I know." Her tone was dull and defeated. He lifted her up into his arms causing a startled sound to come from her. "What the hell Erik? Put me down, I'm perfectly capable of walking. It wasn't my legs that jackass hurt."

He nuzzled his head into the crook of her neck as they walked across Magnolia "I missed you so I want to hold you, is that a problem?"

After a few grumbled words, he felt her cheeks spread into a smile against his skin as she relaxed against him, secretly pleased at his actions. He could feel her happiness, it was intoxicating.

"So he really is with the celestial mage? Interesting. That'll make things a whole lot easier." Midnight was hidden in the darkness watching the dragon slayer walk along with his woman in his arms, The smirk on the dark mage's face indicated that their happiness wasn't going to last, not as long as the Oracion Seis needed their reptile back.

* * *

"Where did you go Erik? You were gone for two days." Lucy sat in between Cobra's legs as he ran a comb through her wet hair. After a long soak in the bath and an ice pack against her face, she felt much better. He placed the comb onto the side table and ran his hand down her arm causing goosebumps to pop up on her skin, following where his fingers touched.

"Do you want the short version? My old guild mates broke out of jail and they tried to recruit me. They need me for this big job they had planned but I turned them down. Then they told me about Cub- I mean Kinana. I had to go with them. I needed to save her. Their base was all the way in Hargeon so I had to travel with them and trust me, that wasn't much fun at all." He placed his head on top of hers and groaned.

"I can never rid myself of that life, it's always going to come back to haunt me. Is it too big a dream to wish that I could just exist here, with you? I don't want to be Cobra from the Oracion Seis anymore but that's all people will ever think of when they see me. Being that person served it's purpose and saved me but I don't need or want it anymore"

Her heart ached for him, he'd tried so hard to get to where he was now and people just kept trying to drag him back down with them. "It's not a dream Erik, this is reality. You are with me and we're certainly existing. I'll kick their ass if they come back, nobody is taking you away."

She spun around on the floor so she was facing him, she had an idea that might put a smile on his face. "I have something that you need to see. Hide behind that sofa."

Looking very confused as he was pushed behind the sofa, Lucy quickly grabbed her celestial keys and summoned someone who wasn't very happy with her.

"Pun pun." Plue said as he crossed his tiny arms and sat on the floor. "Plue, I have a surprise for you. Go behind there." Lucy gently nudged him in the direction of Cobra who was starting to get a small smile on his face. Plue stood up onto his shaky legs and plodded to the back of the room, when he saw Cobra crouched there he exclaimed loudly and leaped onto the dragon slayer's face.

"Pun puuuun pun punnn" Plue said excitedly, obviously happy to see the maroon haired man. "Hey there buddy." He shot Lucy a look as he tried to pull the excitable spirit off his face "I take it he missed me. Probably more than you did."

Plue settled onto Cobra's lap and spent the next forty minutes talking to him. Lucy had to hold in the fit of laughter that was trying to escape her lips, Cobra's expression was priceless, to be fair he was truly trying to keep up with whatever Plue was saying but as they didn't speak the same language it was pretty much impossible.

Cobra just added "Ah" and "Ooh" at certain intervals.

Eventually Plue had tired himself out and returned to the celestial realm so when that happened, Lucy took his place on Cobra's lap and kissed his cheek.

He wasn't happy about that though and pointed to his lips "I think I deserve more than that after what I just had to deal with. Do you have a clue what that little weirdo says? He's cute but wow how does he have so much to talk about?"

"What did you want instead then? Anything at all." She moved to straddle his lap and looked down at him with a sultry smile on her face to which Cobra clocked on to straight away and knew what she wanted. Her arousal was all around him, he could smell it in the air and it was making his mouth water.

His member was pressing against her barely covered core, fighting to get out of his trousers and inside of her. She was clad in silk underwear and his t-shirt that reached down to her mid thighs but he grabbed the material and bunched it around her waist, so he could feel her soft skin on his hands and also so he could grind her onto his aching dick.

He was more than a bit frustrated, having Kinana living with him meant that he couldn't find any spare time to relieve any of his pent up tension.

"Don't stop" Lucy breathed out, he realized that his fingers had moved into her underwear and were rubbing against her dripping sex. When he stopped moving she groaned in frustration and started to grind against his hand, insisting that he carry on.

Pulling his hand away she growled at him but he silenced that with a deep kiss. Leading her to the bed, he didn't lose contact with her lips once. A lick here, a suck there. Then they were lying on the mattress.

Cobra's hands became frantic as he tried to shed all of their clothing, his fingers refused to cooperate as his excitement and nerves got the better of him. Lucy's small hand landed on top of his. Lucy's soft voice drifted to his ears, her soul was humming a sweet tune to him that helped calm him down.

Taking a deep breath, he pulled away the last barrier of clothing between him and his angel.

Looking down at her, he felt like the luckiest guy in the world, he must be to be gifted with such a perfect woman, body and soul. He wanted to believe he deserved to see her like this, spread open and waiting for him, maybe he did.

* * *

"That was unbelievable." Lucy had a dreamy look on her face as Cobra relaxed at her side.

"I'm glad you enjoyed it, are you going to behave now and try and get some rest?" When she didn't respond he looked at her face and wasn't overly surprised to see that she had indeed fallen asleep. The bruise on her face was now a deep purple and covered the whole of her left cheek and her eye socket.

He wouldn't let anyone hurt her again, this should never have happened.

A small beeping caught his attention, seeing a light coming from his jeans pocket on the floor, he lifted Lucy off his chest and placed her gently on the bed. Picking up his lacrima from his jeans on the floor, he answered it straight away when he saw it was Kinana.

"Hey Cu, did you get home okay?" Her face looked serious and a little bit frightened. A million different things went through his mind as to what she was going to say but none of them were right.

"Erik, Midnight's here, he says he wants to talk to Lucy."


	14. Chapter 14

"I'm not waking her up Kin, she's just passed out. I don't think she's been sleeping since we fell out. What the hell does that idiot want?" Cobra glanced back at Lucy, she looked so peaceful, he definitely wasn't waking her up for that prick.

"I told him that I wanted nothing to do with their business anymore. Tell him to fuck off and send him packing or I'll come over and deal with him if he's giving you trouble. I know you can handle yourself but he's a slippery little bastard"

She gasped as a glinting piece of metal appeared on the screen, pressing against her neck was a sharp pocket knife. It was a special gift from Brain, given to Midnight for his birthday years ago.

He was always one for sneak attacks so why not give him a small handy knife to finish them off with? Midnight's voice came from the lacrima "Take the blonde to your apartment, we need to have a little chat, just me and her."

Cobra growled loudly "I'm not leaving her anywhere with you, do you think I'm a fucking idiot? Get the hell out of my apartment. I'm coming over right now to kick your scrawny ass Macbeth."

Reaching to grab his trousers off the floor, his attention shot back to the lacrima when he heard a sharp intake of breath, glancing at the screen, Kinana now had a stream of blood trickling down her neck.

"For fuck sake Midnight, what do you want from me?"

He chuckled darkly, finally showing himself. "Dude what happened to your face? Someone from the council finally find you?" His face was littered with bruises and cuts, his lip had been ripped open and his nose was almost definitely broken. Midnight smiled as a knock sounded at the door on Cobra's end.

"No Erik, I think they've found you."

 _'What the hell does that mean'_

* * *

"Cobra of the Oracion Seis, this is the magic council, we know you're in there, come out quietly and we won't resort to using force."

Lucy started to stir in the bed next to him, the loud voice obviously being too loud for her to ignore. "Erik, what's going on?" She mumbled some curse words as she turned to face him with her eyes still closed. Feeling his chest start to constrict painfully, Cobra felt like everything was slipping away from him and the walls were closing in around him.

Everything he had worked so hard for, it was about to vanish right before his eyes and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. Knowing it was all Midnight's doing, he looked down at the lacrima screen but it was now blank.

 _'Game over.'_

"Lucy I-" Cobra started but a splintering sound echoed across the apartment as the front door to Lucy's apartment was kicked down as council mages spilled in, far more than was necessary but Cobra was a dangerous criminal after all, nobody would ever let him forget that.

"Cobra, please return back to the magic council with us, you have breached the terms of your parole and so you will be returned to prison as of right now. Any actions now that aren't you stepping forward with your hands raised in front of you for us to put cuffs on will be taken as an act of violence and so we will act accordingly, do you understand what I am saying?"

Lucy was now sitting up in bed, completely naked and in shock of the amount of people that were now in her apartment.

"What the hell, breach of parole, you are fucking kidding me?" Shrugging off his jacket, Cobra placed it around Lucy's shoulders and placed a sweet kiss on her forehead.

"See ya babe."

He turned around and held his hands out as they wrapped the cuffs around his wrists, shoved him out of the doorway and down the stairs, Lucy ran after them, wrapped in Cobra's jacket which fell down to her mid thighs. "What did he do? He's been on his best behavior, this has to be a mistake."

One of the council mages turned around and smiled at her.

"There's no mistake, he assaulted a gentleman at a nightclub in town tonight, there are several witnesses that are willing to testify they saw him there now please remain calm miss or we will have to restrain you too."

Not waiting for a response, her apartment was soon deathly quiet as Cobra and the magic council mages exited the building, she ran to the window to get one last look at her dragon, just one more look.

She wished she hadn't, he had been pushed onto the ground while one of the guards was kicking him in the gut. Cobra's face was completely shut off, the look said that he was used to getting such ill treatment and had just found a way to block out the pain, like he had a special place in his mind where he was safe, nobody could hurt him there.

Lucy remembered him mentioning something like that when he was telling her about his experience in the tower of heaven, she didn't make him go too in depth as it was obviously a very painful set of memories that she wouldn't ever want to make him remember if he didn't need to.

Flying out of the window, she didn't even think of the repercussions of if she didn't land on a guard and hit the floor instead. Natsu used to make that jump all the time, why couldn't she?

Successfully landing on the back of one of the guards attacking Cobra, she wrapped her arms tightly around his neck and placed her lips next to his ear.

"Back the fuck up asshole." Then she bit it, hard. She didn't stop until she could taste blood and hear him screaming like a little school girl.

Nobody hurt her dragon and got away with it. They were going to have matching jail cells by the end of the night, she welcomed it.

"Lucy no, go back upstairs, I can handle this, it's nothing I haven't gone through before." Cobra's rough voice came through the anger that was clouding her mind, she didn't want to go back upstairs, she wanted to hurt the people that were hurting him.

"Erik, they did this completely unprovoked, I can't stand for this kind of treatment, you're a member of Fairy Tail, you're mine. I won't let scumbags like these." She dug her elbow deep into the back of the guard she was still hanging onto, smirking at the yelp he let out. "Hurt you when you're completely defenseless, it's disgusting."

She hopped off the man's back and swung her leg out so he fell in front of her "Do you hear me? You're fucking disgusting. He's a better man than you will ever be. You should be ashamed of yourselves. He beat up that guy at the nightclub to save me, all you care about is what he did in the past, not right now."

Cobra was staring up at her in complete awe, amazed that she was willing to put herself out there like this just for him. It was something he had never had before and he doubted he would ever be able to get used to it.

"You can come with us too then blondie, you can sit on my lap on the way to the council." One of the guards was actually trying to intimidate her, he was 6ft tall and built like a brick shit house but Lucy stood toe to toe with him, still only clad in Cobra's coat but she was emanating a menacing aura that made Cobra think she could truly take him on.

You could see on her face that she was clearly concentrating on something but before Cobra could work it out, a bright light shone next to her and her true knight in shining armor was there, ready to do her bidding.

Loke adjusted his tie and smiled at Lucy, but soon was floored at her appearance "My princess what happened? Your face, your clothes."

"Loke, I'll tell you about it later but thank you for coming through on your own power, I appreciate it." She pointed at the hulking man standing before them and signaled a thumbs down motion at him "Know what I mean?"

Loke grinned and nodded "I know what you mean Princess." His gaze settled on Cobra, who was still huddled on the floor from the attack from the guards "Cover your eyes, I'll try to keep you out of the firing line."

Placing his hands together he summoned the power of Regulus, shooting beams of light at all of the surrounding enemies, but the giant of a man who had tried to hit on Lucy was floating in the air, being suspended by a noose made of light.

Lucy sauntered up to the floating man and frowned "I'm going to let you live but just remember who beat who. You run back to your little council without Erik and you tell them what I told you. It was self defense. Get both sides of the story next time jackass." Nodding to Loke, the light disappeared and the man fell to the floor.

"Take those cuffs off my man and fuck off." Lucy watched with hawk eyes as the last standing man ran over to Cobra and with shaky hands, removed the magical cuffs that were binding his wrists. "Luce this is a bad idea, maybe I should just-"

"Shut up. Come back to bed, I've had enough for one night, haven't you?" Lucy lifted up the back of Cobra's coat, revealing her naked butt, she slapped one of her cheeks and ran up the stairs laughing. "Thank you Loke, you're the best." Lucy shouted over her shoulders as she ran back to her apartment.

"You lucky son of a bitch." The lion spirit said as he disappeared back to the celestial realm.

Thinking about how close he had just come to losing everything, he stared at the entrance to the apartment building. How had she managed to save him yet again? He was ready to give up but she just simply refused. She didn't care what happened to her just as long as he was safe.

 _'Yeah, I'm the luckiest guy in all of Fiore.'_ He thought as he heard Lucy beckoning him to come back upstairs. Everything could wait until the morning. _'Shit no, Kinana.'_

How could he have forgotten about his friend? She was in more danger now that he hadn't been taken away, no doubt Midnight was going to be very unhappy with this spanner now in the works. It had to be the works of him, no way would that fucker from the bar go to the authorities.

"Luce I've got to go somewhere, I'll be back soon, it's important." No time to go up and explain, he simply shouted up the stairs and ran in his boxers to his apartment, hoping and praying that Kinana was okay and that crazy bastard hadn't done anything stupid that he would make him regret.

Skidding to a stop outside of his door, he tried to use his acute hearing to see if could sense anything at all inside but it was like someone had put up a magical barrier so he couldn't hear anything inside. Throwing his worries to the wind, he unlocked the front door and ran inside.

Relief flooded his body when he saw Kinana tied to a chair in the middle of the living room, she looked a bit cut up but still alive. She had tape covering her mouth so she couldn't speak but she was trying her hardest to get him to understand her.

"Hold on, I don't know what you're saying and your soul is all jumbled up. Are you alright? Where's Midnight?" Cobra was rattling off questions as he untied her and pulled the tape off her face.

"Erik run" Kinana exclaimed, jumping out of the seat she was tied to. "He's going to Lucy's house, he knew this would happen. You have to get back there."

His stomach dropped as dread filled his veins and pumped itself around his body.

 _'How could I be so stupid.'_

* * *

Hearing footsteps enter the room, Lucy kept her back to the door, making it obvious that she was angry "You have angered me."

"Well I apologize but I do not know what I have done to anger you."

Rolling over at the strange voice that definitely wasn't Cobra, she was shocked when she saw the leader of the Oracion Seis standing in her bedroom.

"We have much to discuss Miss Heartfilia."


	15. Chapter 15

Lucy froze at the sight of Midnight standing at the foot of her bed, he had an eerie smile on his face as he stared down at her. His eyes ran up her body, lingering on her uncovered breasts and her shapely legs.

"Hey this isn't a free show." Lucy exclaimed as she pulled her blanket around her shoulders to cover herself from his greedy gaze, it made her insides churn uncomfortably at being looked at like that by someone who wasn't Cobra.

"What the hell are you doing in my house?" Reaching for her gate keys that she knew were on her bedside table, her fingers only grasped air.

Her brown eyes watched as a wisp of inky smoke consumed her keys and transferred them to Midnight's waiting hand. They hit his palm with a soft jingle as he held them away from her reach. Dangling them from one finger, Midnight tutted loudly.

"I said we have some things we need to discuss, you can't end this meeting so soon by calling on one of your little friends to come get rid of me. I just want to talk and once we are done, you may have your keys back."

 _'I could listen but I don't trust a word this guy says and I really don't care. I'll just have to bide my time until I can think of something. I only have one key that I took off to use earlier that I can reach but Plue's not going to be any help, unless...'_

While maintaining eye contact with Midnight, she slipped her hand under her pillow until she felt the cool metal of a celestial key. Grasping it in her hand she sent a pulse of magic into it and silently summoned her only spirit, making sure that his gate opened on the far side of the room away from Midnight's gaze.

"Okay, I'm listening." Lucy huffed out, keeping his attention solely on her and away from the tiny ray of light suggesting that a spirit had been summoned. "What do you want Midnight? Spit it out because I've had quite a tiresome night and I really need my beauty sleep."

Her eyes glanced to where Plue had plodded out of his gate, the little spirit inhaled ready to start talking but looked around the room, sensed the atmosphere and settled for silently shaking in the corner, hiding from sight. Lucy did a tiny nod and hoped her little friend could help her. He was her only hope right now.

A laugh escaped Midnight's painted lips as he slowly descended onto the bed next the celestial mage, he placed his hand on top of hers causing her to cringe away and press herself as far away from the dark mage as she could, which wasn't far enough. Her bed just wasn't big enough.

"You are already such a perfect specimen." He licked his lips as his eyes turned almost predatory. "I could just eat you up."

 _'How could such a weedy looking man be so damn_ ** _intimidating_** _? I need to learn his tricks.'_

"I'd rather you didn't." Lucy suppressed a shudder at the thought of Midnight touching her, he was creepy. She examined his face as she sat with her back against the wall, he looked like he'd been hit by a bus. "Are you alright? Don't get offended but you look like shit."

He frowned but his face soon softened when he remembered about the wounds that adorned his face. He ran his finger down the jagged cut running over his bottom lip, causing it to split open and let a fresh trail of blood trickle down his chin.

"It's a rough life love, a few scrapes are tricks of the trade. This is nothing so don't concern yourself with it. The people on the other end look much worse, trust me."

* * *

"That bastard tricked me." Gajeel roared as he stormed out of the club with Levy and Laxus in tow, a deep gash above his eye was restricting the iron slayers sight and the amount of alcohol he had consumed made it even harder for him to locate where he was going. "Who tricked you? What's going on?" Levy exclaimed loudly.

Gajeel was running his hands through his hair, trying and failing to calm his raging temper.

"After Kinana came over to tell us about Lucy, she left the club and then came back about twenty minutes later to ask where Lucy lived so she could go check on her and make sure she was okay after everything that had happened."

Gajeel punched his fist into a passing building causing a loud crunching sound, unsure if it was his fist or the building that made the sound, Laxus continued pulling the drunken dragon slayer along so he would carry on with his story.

"I told her where Lucy lived because I thought it was Kinana but as soon as I said Bunny's address she disappeared and I got slashed by a blade. It was that shithead Midnight from the Oracion Seis. He enchanted something to make it look like Kinana so I would tell him where Lucy lives then he cut me and made a run for it."

"That bastard I'll-" Laxus started but got interrupted by Gajeel.

"Don't worry, I'm going to kill him too. I got a hit on him before he left with my iron club so he shouldn't even be able to walk after that but he's a stubborn one. There's no way we can fail Lucy twice in one night, we need to get to strawberry street but I can't fucking see."

Angrily swiping at his wound, Gajeel only succeeded at causing more damage, his clumsy fingers ripping the wound open further.

"You idiot, stay still." Levy yanked off her lucky headband that she always wore and wrapped it securely around Gajeel's head, providing a tight hold, stopping the blood and successfully absorbing the flow so he could see again.

Looking down at his tiny girlfriend, he pressed his chapped lips against her now bare forehead and grunted his thanks.

"Come on, we don't have any time to lose, that fucker could be at Lucy's any minute now. Stop dicking around." Laxus shouted as he ran ahead of them, concern etched all over his face. _'Don't worry sis, I'm coming.'_

* * *

"So basically, we need the power of an especially strong celestial mage to open somewhere for us. You don't need to know the specifics but you're the one we need. Being a Heartfilia means that your celestial magic is the strongest there is. I know of the power your ancestors possessed." His fingers were getting closer and closer to her.

"We could have used Angel but she doesn't practice that type of magic anymore after you beat her so badly and her magic was nothing compared to yours so there was a risk it wouldn't work and we didn't want that."

Lucy eyes followed Midnight's slim fingers as they tapped against her thigh, slowly travelling higher and higher. _'If he moves them one more time I'm going to break them, Mavis give me strength.'_

"Why on earth would I help you? You're out of your mind if you think I'd ever do that. I've heard you out now would you gladly fuck off." Lucy gestured for him to leave but he ignored her.

"If you don't help, the council will bust Cobra for helping break the Oracion Seis mages out of prison." Midnight said bluntly. "But he didn't help you escape?" Lucy said, utterly confused.

A devious smile appeared on his face at her words, he placed his hand on her inner thigh and sighed "Oh my dear, he didn't need to, just being-"

Roaring in pain, Midnight yanked his hand away from the blonde's body and growled in anger. True to her word, Lucy had snapped his middle finger back with a sickening crunch.

"You aren't allowed to touch me you pig." Lucy shouted as she shot her fist forward to punch him in the face.

"Alright boss that's enough." A voice grumbled in Lucy's ear as she was restrained from behind, her arms being held painfully tight against her back. "We let you have your fun but she's a bit too feisty for you."

Midnight grunted as he popped his finger back into place and let out a dark chuckle "Yes and that is what will make this all so much more fun. Racer take her outside, we need to leave now. I think our little snake is almost here."

Hearing him say that Erik was nearby she screamed as loud as she could and accepted that she had lost this fight. Glancing back at the corner where Plue was she smiled at her little dog and closed her eyes. "Erik, you stupid fuck. Love you."

Then she was knocked out cold.

* * *

 _'Shit shit shit I'm too late.'_

Cobra raced up Lucy's stairs but knew before he even made it to the top that she wasn't there. He had heard her shout for him. He'd failed.

The apartment was a state, Midnight had taken her and made a mess while he was at it. Walking fully into the room, Cobra was surrounded by Lucy's sweet smell and was almost brought to his knees at the overwhelming sadness that consumed him.

The main thing that caught Cobra's eye was that Lucy was now utterly helpless as he could see her keys were pinned to the wall of her apartment, held there by Midnight's dagger.

 _'Why does he need Lucy?'_

A small clatter sounded behind some boxes in the corner of Lucy's bedroom made him groan loudly.

 _'What the fuck is it now'_

Walking cautiously over to the source of the noise, Cobra pulled away the boxes and was stunned when he saw it was Lucy's smallest celestial spirit, he pounced onto Cobra's leg, pounding with all his might at the man's calf, not really causing any damage but trying his hardest as he shook in fear.

Cobra picked up the spirit and held him at arms length so he didn't get poked in the eye by his swinging limbs. Once Plue opened his eyes and saw who it was that was holding him he squeaked in happiness and stopped shaking. "Plue, what are you doing here? Did you see what happened to Lucy? Where is she?"

Plue nodded and started gesturing wildly. "Pun punn pun pun."

"Can you seriously understand that fucking thing?" A deep voice said from the doorway, spinning around ready to spew some poison, his lungs started to expand ready to attack but he held it back when he saw a beaten up Gajeel entering the room followed by Laxus and a winded Levy.

"Yeah, I actually can now. He said a strange man with black hair and a man with a big nose took her. It was Midnight, no doubt."

Placing Plue back on the floor, Cobra patted his head gently and attempted a weak smile "Thank you buddy you did great, I'll save her, I promise. Now go home and get some rest, I'll see you real soon." Plue nodded and disappeared.

"Let's fucking find Bunny already." Gajeel growled out as he cracked his knuckles and grinned "I'm ready to kick some dark mage scum."


	16. Chapter 16

"N-natsu, is he back? I need him." Running through the guild hall, Levy McGarden scanned the room for the pink haired dragon slayer and pretty much screamed when she spotted his head of hair rolling about on the floor with Gray. It was good that he had such a bright hair color because otherwise he'd be impossible to find.

Rushing over to the squabbling pair, Levy grabbed Natsu by his scarf, successfully pulling him off the ice mage, dragged him along the floor and out into the fresh night air outside the guild.

"Hey, what the hell Levy? I was going to win that, Gray didn't stand a chance. He's clearly been slacking." Attempting to pull away from the petite girl's grasp was proving impossible so he jumped to his feet and hunched his back, allowing her to pull him along behind her.

"You've gotten a lot stronger since I last saw you huh. What's going on? I've only just got back, can't this wait? I've been away for a year and I'm dying for some of Mira's home made grub."

His stomach growled loudly at the thought of her mouth watering food, he grasped his middle and moaned dramatically "Oh the pain, I'm going to die Levy, just go on without me."

"Idiot, you really haven't changed at all. I thought this extended training mission would maybe help you grow up but guess I was wrong." She turned around and pulled his head down, directly in front of hers.

"Listen to me and not your stomach, Lucy's been fine the whole time you've been gone but-" His ears clocked onto the mention of his blonde haired best friend and his face visibly brightened, food soon forgotten as he glanced around the opening of the street they were entering, clocking onto the fact that it was where Lucy's house was.

"Lucy, are we going to see her? She'll have food. I knew she'd be fine anyway, she's my partner after all." He sniffed loudly and frowned "Why are Gajeel and Laxus here?"

"I think the question is why are you here pinky?" Gajeel appeared in the doorway of Lucy's house and scowled.

"Levy I said we could handle it, why have you brought the fire headed idiot? Three of us is fine. I told you to go home and stay there until we get back with Lucy. I don't want you near these psychos, it's not safe."

Natsu stepped forward and sniffed again "There's someone else here too, I recognize-"

"It's me shit head. "Cobra slipped past Gajeel, not even sparing a glance at Natsu and walked down the cobbled street leading out of Magnolia.

"Look, we need to go now otherwise I'll lose any scent of her that's left. It's faint enough as it is. Let him come if you want, the more the fucking merrier" Natsu had a puzzled look on his face as he looked at all the faces around him.

"What's going on guys? Why is Cobra from the Oracion Seis here and where the hell is Luce?"

"That's the thing Natsu." Levy said softly as she placed her hand on his tense shoulder "We don't know."

* * *

 _'Ah, another locked door, what a refreshing change of pace to all the locked windows.'_

After being forcibly removed from her house by the Oracion Seis, Lucy had found woken up on the floor, trapped in a dingy looking house that smelt of mold and death. While she was free to walk around the property but each new room she entered was as empty and plain as the last and some of the doors were locked, keeping her on the right hand side of the property.

 _'This place hasn't had any occupants for a long time'_ She thought as she ran her finger along the dust covered door handle, cringing at the filth that covered everything. She wouldn't say that she was a clean freak but she liked things to be in order, this place was making her twitch.

"Why the hell would they kidnap me and then leave me here on my own?"

"You're not alone." A raspy voice sounded from the darkness. Suppressing a shudder that was creeping up her spine she peeked over her shoulder and let out a small laugh of relief. Turning around, she smiled brightly and took a step forward "Erik you found me."

Stretching her hand out to take his, she was taken aback when the maroon haired man barked out a laugh and took a step backwards "I'm not here to save you Lucy, I'm here to make sure you don't escape. Can't have our little celestial key running away now can we?"

Feeling the blood drain out of her face, she felt at a loss for words. _'Was he working with the Oracion Seis this whole time? No I don't believe it, I can't.'_

Clawed fingers grasped her chin tightly, forcing her to look at the face of the man who she had fallen for, he had a cruel smile on his face. She couldn't stop the way her body reacted to his, she tried to root herself in place and twisted her face away from his.

"You fell for me like a stupid little girl, just like I knew you would. It really wasn't that hard." Trailing kisses down her neck his hand caressed her cheek, she subconsciously pressed her face against his palm, being completely hypnotized by the feel of his lips on her skin. "You need to do what Midnight asks, once it's done we can go back to Fairy Tail and be together."

Slowly opening her eyes, she looked at Cobra's maroon hair, the longer she stared at it, the more he looked, wrong. His hair color wasn't quite right, his voice didn't sound like the scratchy tone she had grown to love. His touch felt cold and empty.

Rolling her eyes, she pressed her hands against his chest and pushed hard. "Cut the crap." She spat out as the impostor smirked at her as he regained his footing. "Erik would never say something like that, this is your doing Midnight so just stop it. He would tell me to fight to the death."

"You're no fun princess." The Cobra impersonator disappeared and she frowned deeply at how stupid she had been. Cobra didn't know where she was, no matter how good his sense of smell was, he wasn't going to find her. Even she didn't know where she was.

"It was visually pleasing seeing you get yourself all hot and bothered. What am I to do now?" Midnight emerged from the corner of the room, he'd clearly been using his magic to cloak himself in darkness so he was hidden from Lucy's sight. She scowled at the man before her and lifted her chin in a defiant motion.

"How about letting me go for a start and then how about dying? That sounds wonderful to me."

"Maybe I'll let you go once you start responding to me, or maybe I might just keep you as my own personal toy. I haven't quite decided yet but I do know that you are far too precious to be left to the hands of someone like Cobra and I don't think I'm ready for death yet, so sorry."

Rubbing her hands over her face, she groaned loudly at the amount of bullshit that was continuously coming out of this idiot's mouth, she debated on whether to bite his nose off and risk making a run for it or playing it safe and just spitting in his face.

Her decision soon became clear when she felt a cold hand cup her ass. Somehow, spitting on him and biting his nose off didn't seem severe enough.

"Get your hand off me or I will personally rip your balls off and shove them down your throat." Her voice was deathly quiet and she was pleased at how rapidly he removed his hand off her and took a step back. Midnight knew that her bite was definitely worse than her bark and he should be careful around this blonde spitfire.

"I can see you're not quite ready yet, how about I come back in a couple of days and see how you're feeling then?" Turning to leave, Lucy grabbed his arm and pouted "Hey now, no need to run off like that, I just don't like being touched like that when I'm already taken for."

"Oh you're taken for alright, by me. You're going to help the Oracion Seis become glorious again and maybe if you're lucky, you can join in on the fame."

His breath was hot on her cheek as he pressed a kiss on her cheek. Fighting the urge to strike him for touching her, again, was difficult but it was important that if she was to escape that she had to play his sick little game. If she wanted to see Cobra again, she had to keep him happy. That was the plan.

"We'll see Midnight." She muttered as she forced a smile at the man before her. Holding out his hand she placed her hand in it and let him lead her out of the room to a part of the house she couldn't reach before. It smelt a lot more pleasant.


	17. Chapter 17

"Look, I get you're trying to be all chummy with me and stuff but I think I'll stick to calling you asshole." Lucy winked at Midnight and collapsed onto the bed she had been told would be hers for the duration of her stay. "Only if that's okay with you of course."

"You know, you're the first person that's ever had the audacity to call me something like that." The murderous look in his eyes turned into one of admiration. "It's most refreshing. If you wait here for me, I'll go get us some food and then brief you on what your role in this plan of ours is." His hand ran along the back of her neck as he walked past. "Don't move princess, or I'll have to punish you."

 _'Yeah, in your dreams creep. Acting even remotely nice to him is killing my soul. I thought I could do it but nope. I'll just have to just not hit him. He seems to like me insulting_ him.' Once he had closed the door, she ran her hands erratically over her body as if trying to rub away his touch. His fingers were too cold, his stare too empty. Everything about him was just wrong. He made her skin crawl.

 _'I just want to go home.'_ She thought as she ran her fingers through her tangled hair. Having her hair played with always made her feel better but doing it to herself sadly didn't have the same effect. _'I wish Erik was here, his fingers feel the best in my hair and he can actually braid it too, I mean what guy can braid hair better than a girl can?'_

"You actually brought her here? I thought I told you I could do it." Voices sounded outside the door Midnight had just left through. It sounded like a woman so it was almost definitely Angel. _'I could go for a fight right now, haven't worked out today yet.'_ Lucy got to her feet, moved her neck from side to side and prepared herself for the crazy bitch to come barreling through the door.

"You're too weak Angel, go be a good girl and get back in bed." If anybody else was listening, they would think she was his kid. She grimaced at the thought. _'As I said, creepy.'_

"I'm just as strong as that blonde bimbo."

A loud crash made the wall shake and Lucy ran to the door, unsure as to why she was going to someone who tried to kill hers rescue. She cracked open the door slightly and peeked through. Midnight was grasping Angel by her neck, her body had collided with a bookcase. _'That must've been the noise.'_

His face was directly in front of hers, so close that their noses were almost touching. Instead of the fearless look that was always on the girl's face, Angel's expression was of someone who was absolutely petrified. Midnight wasn't that scary, right?

"I can make your worst nightmares come to life, don't forget that Angel. Do you want to watch your sister die a thousand times in a thousand different ways?" The white haired girl's lower lip quivered as she shook her head from side to side. Words were actually failing her. Lucy wanted to scream at her for being so weak but she didn't know how long Midnight had been mentally torturing her for. They had been members of the same guild for years, Lucy knew what it was like to be dragged through the mud. She felt bad for her.

But she wasn't the type of person who could just walk away from someone who needed help. It didn't matter what they had done to her, if they needed help, they got help. It was the right thing to do.

Stepping from the ajar door, Lucy put her hands on her hips and frowned, deciding to take the 'I don't care about you Angel.' approach. "Midnight where is my food? And the clothes you promised I'd get?" His eyes flashed as he heard Lucy's voice behind him and his hand relaxed, releasing Angel from his suffocating grasp. She slumped onto the floor, gasping for breath. The skin around her neck had already begun to swell and turn into a rainbow of different colors.

"Ah Princess, I thought I told you not to move or I'd punish you?" He knelt down next to Angel and whispered something in her ear that caused her eyes to widen in disbelief. She clutched her garments and shook her head. "No." She whispered. Midnight's hand clenched into a tight fist as he punched the wall next to her head.

"Take off your clothes! Our guest needs something to wear." He shouted at her. She flinched at his loud tone and started to shoulder off her white dress that she always wore. Lucy stuck her hands out and grasped Angel's shoulder to keep the material attached to her and laughed awkwardly. "Hey now, even a pillowcase would be better than the ugly top I'm wearing." After being taken from her apartment, she only had a long t-shirt that someone had shoved over her naked body. Her legs were bare and she was freezing. This house clearly didn't have heating. A pillow case wouldn't be better but she didn't want this to happen.

"There's no need to go around stealing clothes Macbeth." She thought using his real name might get his attention and luckily, it did. Angel looked at Midnight, her mouth hanging open and her eyes showing clear signs of hurt. "You told her your name?" She whispered.

He scoffed and grabbed Lucy by her arm, pushing her back into the room she had previously left. "Yeah I told her my name, I'm sick of being Midnight. I'm strong now, that name reminds me of being weak. It reminds me of Brain. It's time for a new beginning for the Oracion Seis."

Slamming the door in Lucy's face, his laugh echoed in her ears as his feet retreated away from her room. "See you in a couple of days Lucy."

* * *

"Stop waving at them you idiot." Laxus growled at Natsu as he waved his hand at a couple of girls sitting opposite them at a cafe. The pink haired male looked at his friend, confusion evident on his face. "Why? I'm just being friendly." He waved again and made a 'see' motion with his hand. "Look, I made them laugh. Why is that a bad thing?"

"They're not laughing, they're giggling. Don't lead them on, they'll come over here and-" _'Too late'_ Cobra thought as he heard their erratic thoughts as they got up from their table to approach theirs. He didn't have time for this bullshit, there was no telling what Midnight could be doing to Lucy while they were playing around in some shitty cafe.

 _'I like the one eyed one, he's hot.'_

 _'He's mysterious and looks like bad news, I love that in a guy.'_

When they approached the table, Cobra bared his teeth at them, a growl escaping his lips which soon resulted in their thoughts to go to what he was used to. He smirked at how easy it was to scare people.

 _'That wouldn't of scared Lucy away though.'_

"Let's go already, we're no closer to finding Lucy than Laxus is to finding a girlfriend." Gajeel chucked some jewel onto their messy table and turned to leave, ignoring the bright blush that covered the blonde male's cheeks. Despite being very popular with the ladies, Laxus was as awkward as a 13 year old prepubescent boy. Plus he only had eyes for one person and she didn't have a clue. Mira would always be someone that was unattainable for him and he seemed to be okay with that.

 _'If only he could hear her dirty thoughts. If he did get with the she devil, I would have to watch his back and make sure she didn't lock him in her sex dungeon that she thought about. She always had a creepy look on her face when her mind thought of it, scary.'_

"Look this isn't a social call, Gajeel's right. Get up assholes." Cobra yanked Natsu up by his scarf, Gajeel grabbed Laxus by his headphones and once again they were off. Sometimes, Cobra would think that he caught Lucy's scent but it would turn out to be a bakery cooking something with vanilla or someone that had used the same body wash as her. _'It was never her.'_

"No more snack stops." Natsu groaned and clutched his stomach as Gajeel smacked him around his head. "You eat too much. When you get fat, I'll laugh."

It had been less than a day since Lucy had been kidnapped but the first 24 hours were crucial, if they didn't find her soon, they might lose her forever and that just wasn't an option for him. His ears picked up something familiar. A soul he recognized from the darker times in his life. He sped off down an alley way, jumped over a couple of obstacles and landed on someone with white hair.

"Angel, you son of a bitch, where's Lucy?" The girl stared up at him and then she screamed at the top of her lungs. Cobra blanched slightly and had to let go of her to cover his sensitive ears. _'What the fuck, Angel wasn't a screamer. She was more of a biter.'_

"Hey freak what are you doing? Get off her." A heavy boot kicked him off the girl. Someone with black hair and red eyes pinned him to the floor, they had a dagger made out of shadow pressing against his jugular, ready to kill him without a second thought and he would have if Gajeel hadn't gotten his attention first.

"Hey hey Rogue calm down, Cobra here just got confused. You don't see many gals with white hair." The man's crimson eyes flicked up to look at Gajeel, then the dagger melted away in his hands. "He should have more respect for women. You don't just jump on people and expect not to get hurt."

"Oh no I'm alright, sorry for the misunderstanding." Yukino's timid voice entered Cobra's ears and instantly he knew why he thought he recognized her. _'So Angel has a sister, their souls are almost identical. I don't think she knows where her sister is though or even if she's still alive. Useless.'_

"Seen any of the Oracion Seis around here?" Natsu said bluntly. Everyone stared at Cobra silently. Natsu burst out laughing and held his stomach. "Oh not that member, any of the others. Black haired guy wearing lots of makeup carrying our guild mate, Lucy Heartfilia? Blonde girl, long legs, brown eyes. Big bre-"

Yukino's interest peaked at the mention of her fellow celestial mage. "Lucy? She's been kidnapped? Oh no." She grasped Rogue's arm as they told her all of the details about what had happened.

"Keep her safe kid, it seems they're kidnapping celestial mages. If you see them anywhere or get any information, give me a call. You've got my lacrima number right?"

Rogue nodded, promising to get in contact if they found anything out about Lucy's whereabouts. Yukino promised she'd try her hardest to track down her friend.

* * *

"Look we've been searching all night and all day. Let's go find an inn and continue in the morning?" Cobra knew that they'd almost run out of time. He collapsed onto a nearby bench, letting his head fall into his hands. _'Why am I so useless? I can't even save the woman I love. I can't do anything.'_

 ** _Beep Beep Beep_**

"Is that your lacrima?" Natsu patted his pocket but shook his head. Gajeel and Laxus also shook their head. "Cobra." Natsu said hesitantly, placing his hand on the mans shoulder. "I think your lacrima is ringing."

"I know you idiot." He snapped, yanking the damn thing out of his pocket and sending a pulse of magic into it. Kinana's face appeared in it, he couldn't see her very clearly as she was in a darkened place. She let out a sound of relief. "Thank goodness, you finally answered. I know where Lucy is. Where are you? I need to meet you face to face for this."

Gajeel scoffed loudly and grabbed the lacrima out of Cobra's hand. "How do we know you're the real Kinana and not just another fake Midnight made? It could be a trap. Tell us something only you would know about Cobra."

She sighed in frustration. "He wears cartoon snake boxers." Everyone went silent, Natsu stepped forward and pulled away the waistband of Cobra's trousers to peek at his underwear. He leapt away in shock, letting out a jet of poison at the fire dragon slayer.

Natsu wiped away the poison and a toothy smile stretched his face. "She's right, Midnight wouldn't know that. See you in the morning banana."

Laxus rolled his eyes. "Her name's Kinana, not banana you idiot."


	18. Chapter 18

"Whoever's making that noise, could you shut the fuck up. I'm trying to sleep." A small rustling sounded and a dipping in the mattress indicated that someone was slipping under his bed covers.

Feeling a bubble of rage growing inside him, Cobra leapt from his sleeping position and pounced on whoever dared to crawl into his bed. The only people in the room with him were three guys so whoever was stupid enough to get into his bed would be getting a smack.

"You wouldn't sneak into a Pythons nest so why is it okay to sneak into my-"

His voice cut off as he looked down at his prey. Blonde hair, twinkling brown eyes. Killer smile.

"Lucy?"

A soft giggle left her lips as she lifted her hand to caress his scarred cheek. "Hey trouble, did you miss me?"

His heart pounded painfully in his chest after not seeing her beautiful face for such a long time. "H-how are you here? I thought-" Pressing her finger against his lips to silence him, she lifted her head upwards and pressed her lips against his. "You need to save me. **Wake up**."

His body arched up from his bed and collided with something solid. Cobra fell back against his pillow, groaning in pain at the impact. Another person was moaning also, clearly Cobra's skull was a lot more solid than theirs.

 _'It was just a dream, it felt so real.'_

He could feel the warmth of her lips on his, he could smell her delectable scent. He missed her so much, it was sending him crazy. Looking at Natsu, who had clearly been leaning over him while he was asleep, he rolled his one good eye and growled at the pink haired dragon slayer.

"What the fuck were you doing on my bed peeking at me? Ever hear of personal space? Fucking weirdo."

 _'Being with this imbecile isn't helping my mental health either.'_

"You were making weird noises, I was just checking that you were okay." Natsu held his hand against his red forehead, it was already turning into a bruise from the solid headbutt Cobra had landed on him.

 _'Serves him right.'_

Looking at the clock hanging on the wall, Cobra sprung into action and leapt off the bed. They were late for meeting Kinana. _'Shit we need to go.'_

"Why didn't you wake me? We're so fucking late." As he yanked on his boots, Cobra noted the absence of Laxus and Gajeel. Their beds were empty and their belongings gone. The fire dragon slayer scratched his head, looking extremely guilty.

"They thought it would be best if they went to go and meet Kinana instead of all of us going together. Gajeel thought they would stick out more if all four of us went. I tried to argue it but they left before I could get a word in. So I tried to wake you up and then all of that happened." He shrugged his shoulders and let out a short laugh.

"It's been a pretty bad morning so far, I hope it's going better for them."

"They left without us? Are you shitting me? They don't know what to expect when they go to the meeting point. Those idiots. C'mon we need to go, now."

Grabbing his lacrima, Cobra sent a pulse of magic into it and prayed that Kinana answered and that she and the two idiots were okay. What he saw on the crystal was even better though.

"Erik, is that you?"

 _'Am I dreaming again, this is just cruel.'_

"Lucy this has to be a dream, this is Kinana's lacrima and you're being held captive by my old guild. Please wake me up again." She frowned deeply through the screen and scoffed. "Is that all you have to say? No how are you Lucy, I miss you Lucy. You know what, screw you Erik, screw you."

 _'That is definitely something my Lucy would say and not a dream version of her.'_

"Is it really you?" He said, almost scared of the answer.

"Yes yes it's me. Look I'm still being held captive but Kinana got this lacrima thrown through my window last night, almost taking my head off when it came flying through the glass but still. She recorded a message on it that said for me to wait for you to call, this isn't my lacrima so obviously it won't let me use it."

"I'm so glad you're safe. Have they hurt you? Have you hurt them? Please say you've hurt them." Lucy's eyebrow raised up and she grinned widely. "I may have given a few kicks here and there. Anyway, just listen. The reason they've kidnapped me is because they need me to power up this old machine that they want to use to gatecrash Crocus. I don't know all the details but from what I have managed to find out, it sounds like real bad news."

Cobra racked his brain for what machine they could be wanting to use. He came up with nothing, it wasn't something the Oracion Seis knew about when he was still a member of the guild.

"Stop trying to figure out what it is because you won't be able to. Midnight said that he bought the information off someone. You guys need to get here soon though, I don't need to consent to giving my celestial power to the machine." Cobra's face drained of all color as he listened to what the love of his life was saying.

"It will steal my life force along with my magic. I hate to say this Erik but you need to come save me. I need you."

"Where are you now?" Is all he could muster out. He would run to wherever they were keeping her if he had to, losing Lucy was not an option. It never was.

"I can hear someone coming. They've moved me again so I'm not sure this time. I think I'm near Crocus from some of the landmarks I saw but it's way on the outskirts. We're in an abandoned factory." Her face looked away from the lacrima screen to glance at something in the room she was being kept in.

Now that she had exposed the side of her face, Cobra could clearly see a large blue bruise covering the entirety of her left cheek.

"Lucy who did that to your face? Was it him?" She didn't look back at the screen but dropped the lacrima between her legs, making the screen go black. He would've thought it had been disconnected but he could still feel the magic energy pulsing through the crystal and his sensitive hearing could pick up on Lucy's heavy breathing.

Cobra glanced sideways at Natsu who had surprisingly kept quiet for the entirety of the call, he was pressing his lips firmly together as he tried his best to keep quiet.

 _'At least he has some brains and knows when to keep his big mouth shut.'_

Focusing his ears on the sounds coming from the lacrima, Cobra could hear the chambers of a lock being turned and a door handle being used. What he heard next, made his blood boil.

"Hello my beautiful princess. How did you sleep after our little talk? Are you going to play nice now or do you need another bout of spanking to teach you some manners?"

Cobra expected a snarky reply from his girlfriend but she sounded beaten down and obedient. "I'll be good."

 _'What the hell has he done to her? She sounds broken.'_

It angered him to hear Lucy so placid. But no matter the anger he felt, he needed to keep quiet. Lucy knew that Midnight was a loud mouth and if she kept Cobra on the line, he might reveal some important information as to where they were or what his plans were. There was nothing more Midnight liked to do than boast.

"Good, this pleases me. You and little angel needn't try to pull a little stunt like that again. You don't want to end up like her do you? It's because of you that I had to pluck her of her wings and leave her to the vultures." Cobra could hear Lucy let out a short growl at his words and smiled. She was still somewhat there.

 _'Had Angel tried to help Lucy and got punished for it?'_

Cobra couldn't imagine her doing such a thing, she was a cold hearted bitch that thought of nothing but herself. There was no way she would do something so unselfish with no gain.

"We'll be leaving in the morning sweetheart, try and get some sleep. You'll need all of your energy for tomorrow when we awaken Echion." As Midnight's steps withdrew and disappeared out of the room. Cobra's heart sunk down to the floor.

Echion. That was bad news.

"Hey, I love you idiot. I will see you again. Bye." Lucy's hushed voice calmed him down as he felt the lacrima disconnect. He needed to stay calm and he needed to get to her now.

"I'll call Laxus and Gajeel, let them know that we've spoken to Lucy and see if they got anymore information off Kinana." Natsu shocked Cobra with his level headedness, he wasn't as much of an idiot as he seemed. When it came down to it, he could think logically and make decisions. It was a relief to have him act like this rather than his usual self.

When it came down to Lucy, it seemed like nobody liked to piss around. The look on Natsu's face told him that this wasn't a game to him and rescuing Lucy was all that was running through his mind.

"Right, I'll go pay the person downstairs for the room and get us a carriage." Natsu's face turned a sickly color at the mention of being on a mode of transportation. "Pull it together you idiot, call them, now."

* * *

 _'That was too close. If Midnight's hand had gone any further down my thigh he would've felt the lacrima. He's so disgusting.'_

His touch made her feel sick but he had gotten her down to the point of exhaustion. She hadn't eaten in days and the amount of beatings she had been subjected to was beyond count. Without her celestial keys, she was useless.

Her physical strength was now all but gone. She could only fight so much. Kinana had given her a lifeline by getting someone to throw her lacrima though the window of the house Lucy was being kept in.

Kinana did the only thing she could do, which was give her the means of getting in to contact with Cobra. Risking her life to try and save her was pointless, that would have only resulted in Kinana getting injured or worse.

What had shocked Lucy the most though was her visit from one of the members of the Oracion Seis late last night. Angel had snuck into her room, covered in nasty injuries caused by Midnight. Her fellow celestial mage had offered her assistance.

"I can't watch this happen to you, I don't want this on my conscience." She had flicked her pale hair over her shoulder and examined her nails. "Besides I owe Cobra a favor. Get out of here." Lucy had almost made it off the compound but Midnight and Racer got to her before she could. That resulted in Angel and her getting the living shit beaten out of them and the change in location. She hadn't seen the female member of the Oracion Seis since.

Lucy had regained consciousness halfway through the journey but still feigned sleep. She kept peeking through half lidded eyes to try and absorb any and all memorable landmarks that she could see for when Cobra rang her, which she had faith that he would. The lacrima was safely tucked inside the waistband of her trousers that she was wearing all the way until she had been chucked into her new room.

Now, after that conversation with Cobra, she felt so much better about everything and ready to face whatever they wanted to throw at her. She was ready.

"Psst, Lucy. We're here to rescue you." Lucy whipped her head around but saw nothing but darkness. _'That sounded like Gajeel.'_

Lying down on her bed, she settled on the fact that sleep deprivation was making her go crazy and make her hear people's voices.

"Oi Bunny this is no time to be napping, get over here so we can get the fuck out of here."


	19. Chapter 19

**A/N This chapter made me extremely happy to write.**

"Gajeel? Am I going crazy or is that actually you?" Examining the room she was in, she couldn't see the hulking form of the iron dragon slayer anywhere, feeling insane she pulled up the blanket placed on her bed and spoke in a hushed tone. "You in here Gaj?"

"You idiot." He growled next to her ear, causing her flinch and cover her head with her hands, taking a defensive position. After the amount of times Lucy had been knocked around by Midnight, it had become natural to cower whenever she thought he was near.

She now understood Angel's reaction to Midnight. Lucy had become like this after being around him for such a short amount of time, Angel had been subjected to it for years. She wondered what had happened to her fellow celestial mage but was scared to find out.

"Hey bunny." Gajeel's voice was a lot softer and he tried a different approach. "Lucy. It's me and Laxus. Why are you hiding? We're here to save you." Peeking through a gap between her fingers, she saw that it was actually her friends. _'They made it past all of the members of the Oracion Seis? No way.'_

"You're fake." Lucy stated, keeping her eyes covered and pulled her knees up to her chest. "I'm tired of your tricks Midnight, they're not funny. Leave me alone."

He had pulled this stunt on her before and now he was trying to do it again. _'Does he think I'm an idiot?'_

"Oi." Her hands were suddenly ripped from her face. "Don't be so rough with her." Laxus whispered to Gajeel as he roughly yanked Lucy to her feet, he wasn't used to dealing with a fragile Lucy, he was used to the robust one who worked out with them every morning and beat everyone up.

Feeling extremely vulnerable, she leapt backwards and landed on her back, continuing to crawl away, she pushed her legs outwards to propel her in the opposite direction to Midnight's projections of her friends. "No, I said leave me alone. I don't want to be a part of your little mind games."

"What happened? Your face." Covering her eyes with one of her small hands, she let out a bitter laugh. "You know what happened, you did it after all."

"No I didn't-"

Laxus grasped Gajeel's shoulder and shook his head. "She doesn't think we're real, remember? She isn't joking around. Midnight's had her for a while now, who knows what that sick bastard has been doing to her."

Laxus took a step closer to the celestial mage but stopped his approach when he heard her let out a soft whimper.

Three loud bangs sounded on the door to Lucy's room and a man's voice penetrated through the wall. "Shut up in there princess."

Gajeel and Laxus gave each other a knowing look and as soon as they sensed that the male had left, Gajeel looped his arms around Lucy's waist and activated his shadow magic, effectively hiding them from view and escaped through the only window in the room.

The room was four stories off the floor and the window had been bolted shut from the outside but with Laxus using his lightning magic to warp and melt off the lock, it was easy to access, for them anyway. It would have been impossible for Lucy, which was obviously the asshole's plan.

As they were in Gajeel's shadow form, they simply slid down the building edge. Laxus glanced around the room, frowning and used his own magic to warp out of the building.

Once they were securely out of the room and near the edge of the property, Gajeel shut off his shadow magic and sat Lucy on the floor.

He wanted to get a good look at what damage they had done to her so he could inflict it back, ten times over.

"That looks like a broken nose. So the right thing to do would be to bite his off. Yep okay. Split lip. Bite his off." Gajeel checked over Lucy's face as she sat there, not moving an inch and as pale as a ghost. her eyes were dull and vacant.

"You never let me get out of the building. Take me back, this is just cruel."

Like an elastic band that had been stretched too far, Gajeel snapped. "Stop being so damn stupid Lucy, fucking hell. This isn't a trick. You're safe. I'm real. This is real." She looked about ready to call him a liar as her eyes started to fill with tears.

Finally out of patience, Gajeel jolted forward and sunk his teeth into her shoulder. She yelped in pain and feebly smacked at his head.

"That hurt what the hell." A switch clicked in Lucy's brain and the light appeared behind her eyes. "Gaj? You're actually here… and you bit me." Suddenly feeling full of energy, Lucy leapt onto the iron dragon slayer and started to pull his thick head of hair.

"What possessed you to bite me? Honestly Gaj, you're such a boob. I'm littered in bruises and you think it's a good idea to hurt me some more? Kiss it better." Pushing his head in the direction of her bloody neck, she shoved it repeatedly onto the wound he had just inflicted and made kissing noises.

"I'm sorry Lucy, forgive me Lucy." She mimicked his voice until Laxus's laughter filled their ears.

The two stopped their fighting and looked up at the lightning dragon slayer. He was laughing and smiling but he had tears streaming down his face.

Both Lucy and Gajeel gulped, neither of them were any good at dealing with people when they cried. What do you do? Say you're sorry? Pat them on the back? Who knows, they certainly didn't.

"You okay there buddy?" Gajeel said, clearly freaked out. Laxus wiped away the wet trails and grinned.

"I've never been better. You don't realize how much I've missed hearing you two argue. I'm so happy."

Abandoning her attack on Gajeel, Lucy got to her feet, held her arms behind her back and raised an eyebrow at her closest thing to a brother.

"Where's my hug bro?" Before she'd even finished speaking, Laxus had enveloped her in a suffocating bear hug and buried his nose in her hair. "Don't ever leave us again. I'm so sorry we couldn't protect you, we broke our promise."

Feeling safe in his arms, Lucy let out a long sigh and closed her eyes. The nightmare was finally over. "Don't sweat it, it's my own fault. You saved me though."

"Hey, let me in." Gajeel wormed his way into the group hug but he turned it more into a huddle. "Okay guys, sorry to break up this family reunion but we're still near those bastards that kidnapped Lucy, we need to go."

Pulling Laxus's and Lucy's hands into the middle of the three of them, Gajeel placed his hand on top of theirs and pushed down three times.

"Okay we break in three, then we run, okay? One, two, three." The trio ran off like their pants were on fire, their laughter echo'd behind them. Not unheard by a certain man watching the mages from the house's window.

"Midnight, why are you letting them go? I thought we needed the celestial mage?" Racer started bouncing on the heels of his feet as he watched Lucy disappear from sight.

Midnight held his guild mate back and smiled. "We don't need her anymore. It turns out that Angel will do just fine, I was overestimating how much celestial energy we would need to awaken Echion."

Racer growled and turned to leave the room. "So this was all a giant waste of time? You just wanted to play with Cobra's toy didn't you?" Midnight opened his mouth in mock disbelief and smirked, "I would never do something to intentionally hurt Erik. It was fun though."

Midnight had no doubt in his mind that he would be seeing Lucy again, very soon.

* * *

Cobra had gotten a call from Laxus telling him and Natsu to return to the guild. They had Lucy with them.

He swore he had never been so nervous in his entire life. His palms were sweating for fuck sake. Luckily when they had gotten the call, they hadn't left for Crocus yet so the journey back to Magnolia wasn't so long. If he had to wait any longer to see Lucy, he was going to go insane.

Cobra had made them get a carriage almost the whole way but he didn't want to feel all pukey when he was reunited with Lucy so he had it pull over just before entering Magnolia so he and Natsu could freshen themselves up a bit.

The pink haired slayer was as excitable as always, it was kind of annoying.

"I can't wait to see Luce, it's been months." Cobra continued walking side by side with him, not speaking a word when Natsu's hand grabbed his arm, stopping him from walking. "Hey idiot, I want to get there sometime soon, don't stop m-"

"You love Lucy." Natsu said matter of factly. Cobra's face heated slightly but he nodded. "Yeah of course. What of it?"

His serious face melted away, replaced with the carefree expression Cobra was used to seeing on the fire dragon slayer. Obviously what Cobra had said was what Natsu wanted to hear. "Nothing, just checking."

 _'Okay, that was weird.'_

"I'm going to hang back here, go on without me." Natsu took a step backwards as the Fairy Tail guild came into view. Cobra glanced back at him and listened with his magic to hear if he had any ill intentions but the three words he heard from him made his heart warm up for the younger mage.

 ** _'Go get her.'_**

"You're not a bad guy Natsu. Sorry for all the trouble between us in the past, I hope we can move past it." Getting into a run, he headed towards where his girl was waiting for him.

When Cobra reached the guild doors, he could immediately sense her. Her soul. It was reaching for him. Everything else melted away as he heard footsteps pattering across the guild and the doors in front of him flew open and there she was. His beaten up princess.

Lucy gasped for breath from running over to him and grinned up at his face. "Hey there handsome." Feeling an overwhelming amount of love rush through him, he picked her up into his arms as she wrapped her legs around his waist.

"I love you. I love you so much." She showered his face with kisses as he squeezed his eye shut to try and hold back the wave of tears that were threatening to spill over.

"I really missed you. I'm sorry, I was too late. I shouldn't of left you." Pressing their foreheads together, their lips met in a soft, passionate kiss. His knees went weak at the contact.

"You look like shit." Cobra murmured against her lips, she let out a short giggle and dug her heel into his hip.

"Be nice."

Holding her face in his hand, Cobra scowled as he saw all of her wounds up close. "I'll kill him for what he's done to you."

Lucy shook her head. "We just need to stop them Erik. Help me stop them?"

"I promise, we'll stop them."

 _'They were once my family but now I have you Lucy. You're my family. I promise, I'm going to destroy them.'_


	20. Chapter 20

"I hope you realize that I'm never leaving this room ever again." Lucy was spread eagle on her bed, surrounded by an assortment of foods that she was trying to shove in her mouth.

After being fed nothing but tasteless slop while being Midnight's captive, she wanted to remember what the good life tasted like again.

Cobra was sat on her bedroom floor with his back against the bed frame, a huge smile stretching his lips. Even with food smeared all over her face and in her hair, she was still the most beautiful woman in all of Fiore.

She was getting her shine back and boy was her soul singing. It made him happy knowing that nobody else could make her do that.

"Hey Erik, look at me." Lucy mumbled through a mouth of food. He turned his head and immediately regretted it. A glob of cream hit him square in the face, soon followed by Lucy's warm tongue licking it off.

"Mm, tastes even better." Cobra amethyst eye stared at her in shock as she licked his face clean and then wiped it with a napkin. She smiled innocently and stuck her tongue out at him.

"I just wanted to see if you could improve the taste of this cream puff and trust me, you did." She had a thoughtful look on her face as she stared at the jar of chocolate spread sitting on her bedside table. He shook his head violently from side to side and shuffled away from the crazy person who had possessed his girlfriend.

"No Luce, no way. Get the hell away from me, that shit is sticky as hell." She let out a loud cackle as she grabbed the jar and lunged for Cobra. His screams could be heard for miles.

* * *

"Okay I am **very** angry with you right now." After the chocolate spread war, the pair had to shower and get changed into new clothes before they went out.

Fairy Tail was holding a welcome home party for Lucy and Cobra had to practically drag the celestial mage from her apartment. Her time spent with the Oracion Seis was a distant memory, thanks to Wendy. She had used her magic to heal Lucy's wounds and bruises.

Cobra would have used that to his advantage and had a bit of fun with Lucy but her first and only priority since she had returned was food and sleep, while he had been left in the background, waiting patiently for his turn.

It had been three days and he was still being neglected. Trying to mix him with food was one of the worst ideas Lucy could've come up with but it seemed to sate her appetite and she was back to normal. Or so it seemed.

"Don't be angry Erik, you tasted very yummy." She linked her hand with his and pressed her body against his. His anger slowly started to disappear at the warm feeling of her skin pressed against his. She was his only weak spot and he would never allow her to be exploited ever again.

Midnight was going to pay for all of this. One thing hadn't made sense to Cobra, why would Midnight allow Lucy to escape?

There was no way that Gajeel and Laxus would have gotten into the building without his knowing and he definitely wouldn't of let them escape with Lucy if he actually needed her which meant one thing.

Cobra gritted his teeth as he thought about his ex guild mate.

 _'He only kidnapped Lucy to piss me off. Well he's fucking succeeded at that.'_

"Hey Erik, stop thinking about things that make you angry. You're practically growling. Down boy." She slapped his bum playfully and burst out laughing at his expression. He was staring down at her, a very sad look on his face.

"Why are you acting like this when there isn't a bed around ready to use? Dammit Luce you tease."

"Yo love birds!" Cobra covered his ear with his free hand and cringed at the loud voice shouting through the silent night. Lucy scowled and pointed at the figure at the end of the path they were walking down with their conjoined hands, trying to look menacing and failing miserably.

She was dressed in an adorable pink frilly dress and her hair was in pigtails. She looked cute as fuck and not scary at all.

"Pipe down asshole, we're having a moment." The person's voice got louder as he laughed and a wave of feedback echoed around them.

 _'That explains it, the idiot's got a megaphone. Where the hell did he get a megaphone.'_

"Natsu, where the hell did you get a megaphone from?" Lucy stomped forwards, dragging Cobra behind her as she stalked her prey. He could hear Natsu fumbling with the megaphone as he tried to escape Lucy's wrath but in the end, she always got her man.

She squeezed Cobra's hand once and let go so she could pummel some sense into the fire dragon slayer.

"You idiot." She spoke through gritted teeth as she landed a kick on his chest, successfully knocking the wind from his chest. Cobra reached out to hold the fluttering material of her dress down so nobody could see what was for his eyes only.

"I'm sorry Luce, I found it in the bin outside the guild. It works fine and-" She punched his face sending him into the floor. "I don't want your excuses, just get rid of it."

She pressed the palm of her hand against her forehead and let out a long sigh. "Now I have a headache, well that's too bad, c'mon Erik let's go back to bed and pick up where we left off." Natsu thought she meant something sexual and cringed but Cobra knew that she just meant finish what she hadn't finished eating.

No way was he going back to that apartment, not when there were so many spreadable foods that she could smother him with. He shuddered at the thought.

"No baby." Cobra said in a sickly sweet voice, gently pushing Lucy in the direction of the guild hall and past the dazed Natsu. "We're going to this party, you will socialize with your friends while I hide in the corner and you will enjoy yourself."

She groaned but allowed herself to be led to the open doors of the guild where all of Fairy Tail were waiting for her arrival.

Not that they noticed she was there. Cobra clocked onto two things. The guild was a shit hole and everybody was so drunk that they didn't even realize that their guest of honor had arrived.

"These people." Cobra mumbled as he shook his head in disbelief. Mira was rushing to get everyone's orders so she didn't see the pair arrive, nobody else had an excuse.

"Hey assholes, Lucy's here. Get off your asses." Cobra's voice shook everyone out of their drunken stupor, and they rushed towards her.

He tried to slip away before the hordes reached them but Lucy's hand held him in a death like grip. An evil glint twinkled in her eyes as she yanked him back to her side.

"Oh hell no baby, we're in this together. Where I go, you go." She pressed a quick kiss against his cheek and greeted all of her friends with a very displeased Cobra stuck to her side.

* * *

"It's so damn loud in here, I can't think. I can just hear other people thinking." Cobra had tried to escape many times but Lucy had pulled him back by the tip of his pointy ear.

"If you can make it another hour, I'll definitely make it worth your while." The sultry look in her eyes caught his attention, he was interested now.

"Oh yeah." He said gruffly, a small smile on his face. "Go on then, one more hour."

They were there for three and Lucy was too drunk to go through with any of the plans that she had promised. After saying goodbye to any of the mages that were still conscious, Cobra carried Lucy home as she sung for him. Not her soul but actually her. She was singing about snakes and some other bullshit.

"We're going back to mine Luce, your bed is full of crumbs and food. You know how dirt makes me feel."

That would definitely be the cherry on top of a shittastic night.

"We have to go back." Lucy mumbled against his chest. He rolled his eye and picked up the pace. "Hell no. We are not going back to the guild. Everyone's done for the night and so are you so we're going straight to bed. No sympathy for you in the morning when you're hugging the toilet."

"We have to go back for her." Cobra frowned in confusion. "What?" She clawed at his shirt and pulled her head up to gaze at him, her eyes were full of tears. He screeched to a stop and gently placed her back onto her feet.

"Lucy? What the hell is wrong? Don't cry, I'm sorry. We can go back if-"

"No!" Lucy shouted, shaking her head from side to side. "We have to save her, Angel. We can't leave her Erik, promise me. We'll go back for her."

 _'She's still thinking about that bitch?'_

He wiped her hair out of her face and caressed her soft skin.

"Luce, let her rot. She'll get what she deserves, nothing less." A sharp slap across the face shut him up.

Looking fully sober now, Lucy stood tall in front of Cobra, her eyes burning holes through his. "We will return for her, she isn't the same as she once was Erik and she doesn't deserve to be dragged down with those putrid excuses for human beings. You changed, why can't she?"

He had her there. Picking her back up bridal style, he marched them towards his apartment. "Alright fine but not yet. I want to have a good night's sleep with my girlfriend, without being surrounded by half eaten food."


	21. Chapter 21

**A/N So sorry for the lateness of this update, but it's here now, we're almost at the good stuff. Thank you for all the follows and favorites, you guys are the absolute best and it makes me very happy to know you like what I'm writing.**

"So that's what's going to happen, oh by the way, snacks are over on the right, help yourself." Lucy had gathered all of the people she thought were capable of enacting her intricate plan of taking down the Oracion Seis at her apartment for an emergency meeting.

Natsu was more than willing to cancel his next mission he had lined up to help her. Gajeel and Laxus obviously wouldn't let her do it without them.

Then there was Cobra. He wanted to be the one to finish his old guild off and put them in the ground. Lucy knew that if anybody deserved to do it, it would be him. He deserved closure.

Other people would have liked to have been involved in the mission but were either away on missions or Lucy didn't want them there along with them. The absolute last thing she wanted was for anybody to get hurt when they didn't need to.

So her idea was the smaller the group, the better.

Preventing Midnight from using their weapon, Echion, was their number one priority as if they didn't stop them from awakening it, Crocus would be history. Then the rest of Fiore would be too.

The Oracion Seis would destroy anything and everything they could get their grubby little mits on just because they could. That was how Midnight worked, he liked to bring everyone's worst nightmares to life, he fed off people's fear. There was no hope for him.

As Lucy's eyes scanned her living room, she couldn't help but feel so thankful for being gifted with such an amazing family.

Cobra was stood at the very back of the room, with a look of disdain on his handsome face as he stared at Natsu who was completely oblivious to the unimpressed glare he was on the receiving end of.

The fire dragon slayer just continued to stuff his cheeks full of any and all food he could get his hands on.

 _'He actually looks like a chipmunk. Is he going to hibernate with all that food?'_

"Move along, you've got enough. Go sit your ass down, Lucy's trying to talk but she can't over the sound of you stuffing your face, pig."

Cobra's voice sounded stern as he batted the fire dragon slayer away from the buffet table with a book he had picked up but she could sense an undertone of happiness at doing something so normal.

Cobra's whole life was spent running and surviving. He had never been given the chance to just live, completely carefree. There was always something niggling at the back of his mind, a what if.

Lucy just wanted to set him free from his past demons, taking down the Oracion Seis for good would be a great start.

"Thank you Erik." Lucy aimed a flirtatious wink at him and giggled as his face instantly grew hot and he quickly averted his eye. Teasing him was her favorite pastime.

"Okay, so obviously the main objective is to destroy their newest weapon, which we know is called Echion and that it is super fucking strong."

"Watch your language young lady." Rolling her eyes at Gajeel, she quickly continued. The more time they spent here, talking and having a joke, the closer Midnight got to completing his sick plan.

 _'I wonder how Angel's doing, she must be alive, they can't awaken the beast without celestial energy.'_

"The second objective, rescue the Oracion Seis member called Angel." A couple of groans of disagreement sounded from the room but Lucy was quick to nip them in the bud.

"Yes yes I know we've all had our own disagreements with the witch of the Oracion Seis but this is different. Don't forget, she did try to help me escape." Laxus, who had been previously scowling at the idea of rescuing a member of the enemy team was now staring in shock. Lucy let out a little laugh.

"Granted, we didn't make it too far but she still tried, that's the main point. Now it's my turn to rescue her. So shush."

Cobra cleared his throat and made his way to the front of the room, settling in the spot next to Lucy.

"Plus, she'll be the one that they'll be using to power the machine, so tough shit. We need to rescue her to stop them from using her, simple."

It was like they were playing good cop, bad cop. Cobra would make an extremely sexy bad cop.

 _'You can cuff me up anytime.'_

Lucy had to give it to him, even though he probably heard every word of what she had just thought of but he kept a stoic face until the people cleared out and it was only the two of them left.

"Oh, so you don't mind if I cuff you up?" Cobra ran his fingers through his maroon hair, trying to vent some of his frustration on the poor strands.

"Lucy, I had a huge hard on for the rest of the meeting, you're evil."

Wrapping her arms around his shoulders, she pressed a soft kiss against his neck and grinned.

"Yeah, but so are you."

"Where's everyone gone?" Lucy and Cobra froze as a drowsy sounding Natsu stumbled through her living room, past the embracing couple and collapsed on top of Lucy's bed.

His loud snores soon followed.

"Are you fucking kidding me asshole? We need to use that for other activities." Cobra roared as he pulled himself away from Lucy's grasp and leapt onto the sleeping dragon slayer.

 _'Well, I can't be left out of a fight in my own bed.'_

Lucy smirked as she saw an opening in between the two wrestling men and vaulted over the bed.

Natsu's screams soon put Cobra out of commission as he had already been taken out of the fight by his yells before that he wasn't willing to risk another perforated eardrum. As he ducked and rolled off the bed to safety, Lucy soon had the pink haired dragon slayer submitting to her.

"I give, I give. Let go of my armpit hair, dammit woman." Cobra let out a wheezing laugh at the sight of his girlfriend having a death grip on another man's armpit hair. He knew first hand that it was one of the most painful experiences on this planet. She'd done it to him several times.

* * *

"Okay we're going now, is everyone ready?" Lucy was the only cheery one amongst the whole group for one very good reason, she didn't suffer from motion sickness unlike the rest of her companions. Laxus, Gajeel, Cobra and Natsu were all lying across the coach seats looking pitiful. The cart hadn't even started moving yet.

"Come on guys, get your game face on, big day ahead of us." As the driver got the vehicle moving, the first trots of the horse caused a loud harrumph to come for all of the four men. What else could the celestial mage do but go for a little snooze?

"Stop the vehicle this instant." Lucy jolted up in her seat along with the rest of the group.

"Where do I recognize that voice from." Natsu scratched the top of his head, desperately thinking about where he had heard such a strong, commanding voice.

His eyes widened as they glanced at the door to the carriage.

It had been yanked open, almost to the point that it had been ripped off it's hinges. Lucy squinted through the light that was beaming from the doorway. "Erza? Wendy? What are you doing here? I thought you were on a mission?"

The younger girl scratched the back of her head as she hopped into the carriage and sat in between Natsu and Gajeel's slumped bodies.

"Erza's not happy with you guys." Was all Wendy had to say before the scarlet haired mage took the first step through the doorway.

Her eyes were smoldering with something unreadable as she directed her gaze at all of the mages inside. The tension in the room was almost unbearable, but then it all but dissipated.

Gently closing the half broken door, Erza pushed Cobra with the hilt of her sword so he was leaning against Lucy's body and took the only remaining seat. All of a sudden, the cabin was uncomfortably full, they had been pushing the capacity with the five of them before.

The driver glanced through the little gap below his feet to make sure everyone was now seated and started the long drive to Crocus.

"Lucy." Erza said in a stern voice, turning her head slowly to face her, Lucy pulled her most angelic face. "Yes dearest Erza?"

Her steel plated chest pressed against Lucy's face and all but broke her nose from the impact. Poor Cobra was stuck in between the interlocked girls and could do nothing but groan at the pressure on his already pounding head.

Natsu shifted his head to the side, saw the situation his fellow dragon slayer was in and sent a sympathetic groan his way.

Gajeel and Laxus also sent their grunts his way too, Lucy would have found it hysterical if she wasn't also in the bone breaking embrace.

"We are good friends are we not Lucy?" Erza's voice sounded tight and slightly choked. All the celestial mage could do was nod, her emotions were getting the better of her and she couldn't talk with the fear of turning into a blubbering mess.

"I know you want to protect us all but I want to protect you, you're like a sister to me. Myself and Wendy will be accompanying you on this mission to destroy the Oracion Seis."

As she pulled away slightly, she stared down at Lucy with misty eyes. "Just like old times right?" Lucy let out a short laugh and caressed the top of Cobra's head.

"Except we've got him this time."

"Uh guys." Wendy's sounded extremely distressed as an acidic smell spread around the small cabin. "Help me."

Breaking away from each other, their eyes grew wide as they saw what was causing the small dragon slayer to be freaking out so badly. Natsu had his head resting in her lap and had spewed his guts all over her thighs.

"That's nasty." Cobra choked out, even though he was barely conscious, he still held his nose closed to stop himself inhaling the disgusting smell.

The rest of the cabin grunted in agreement and decided to hang Natsu out of the window for the rest of the journey.

* * *

"I hate you." Angel's venomous comments were falling on deaf ears as she fought against her restraints.

"Everyone hates me sweetheart, it's what I love."

Midnight was sat in the corner of the dimly lit room with a bored expression on his face as he flicked through book after book.

"Why are they taking so long, I don't-"

"Midnight." Racer had appeared beside him, not even sparing the battered and bruised Angel a glance as he gave his report. "Mages from Fairy Tail are leaving Magnolia now, Cobra's with them. So's the celestial mage."

This peaked the man's interest and he snapped the book he was reading shut and got to his feet.

"That's fantastic news, I suppose we should go and get dear Echion ready then." His eyes shone with excitement as he whipped out a stream of his darkness to wrap around Angel's neck.

"You'll be coming with us dear, it's time for you to give your life for the greater good."

Fear shot through her body as she was dragged along behind them like a stray dog. This was what being decent got you. Pain and suffering.

 _'You best come stop this asshole Fairy.'_


End file.
